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LIBRARY 

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THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

Gift  of 
Joseph  M.  Brans ten 


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THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG 


THE     LIVELY 
CITY    O'    LI  GG 

A     Cycle     of    Mocfern     Fairy    Tales 
for    City     Children 

BY 

GELETT    BURGESS 

FORMERLY  EDITOR   OF  THE   "LARK" 

AUTHOR    OF    "VIVETTE,"    ETC. 


WITH   FIFTY-THREE   ILLUSTRATIONS 
BY  THE   AUTHOR 


NEW    YORK 
FREDERICK    A.    STOKES    COMPANY, 

PUBLISHERS 


COPYRIGHT,    1899, 
BY    GELETT    BURGESS 


,    Uf]nAH7 


TO 
ARNOLD'S    SENSITIVE    TASTE 

AND 

ROBIN'S    ADVENTUROUS    SPIRIT 

THESE    HEADLONG    FANCIES 
ARE    FEARFULLY    SUBMITTED. 


IU 


nK 


The  Author  and  Illustrator  desires  to  express  his 
gratitude  to  MR.  HARVEY  ELLIS,  of  Rochester,  N. 
Y.,  for  the  interest  he  has  added  to  this  book  by  a 
sympathetic  colouring  of  the  plates,  achieved  with  an 
originality  far  above  the  capacity  of  their  envious 
draughtsman. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS,  .           .           .           .           .  .  .11 

PREFACE.    THE  CIDIVATION  OF  INANIMATE  THINGS.  .  .      17 

CHAPTER 

.  I.  THE  TERRIBLE  TRAIN,   ......      31 

II.  THE  RUNAWAY  CHAIRS,            .           .           .  .  41 

III.  THE  THREE  ELEVATORS,           .           .           .  .  .55 

IV.  THE  VERY  GRAND  PIANO,       .           .  "        .  .  .63 
V.  THE  PERT  FIRE  ENGINE,           .           .           .  .  .73 

VI.  THE  INSANE  BATTERY,  .            .            .           .  .  .83 

VII.  THE  HILARIOUS  HANSOM,         .           .           .  .  .95 

VIII.  THE  STEAMBOAT  AND  THE  LOCOMOTIVE,      .  .  .105 

IX.  THE  BOTHERSOME  BRIG,            .           .           .  .  .119 

X.  THE  HOUSE  WHO  WALKED  IN  HER  SLEEP,  .  .  .131 

XI.  THE  BOLD  BALLOON,      ......     143 

XII.  THE  LAZY  LAMPPOSTS,   ......     153 

XIII.  THE  BICYCLE'S  FAMILY,  ,           .           .  .  .165 

XIV.  THE  FLYING  STABLE,     .           .           .           .  .  .     175 

XV.  THE  BLIND  CAMERA,      .            .            ,           .  .  .187 

XVI.  THE  BUMPTIOUS  BRIDGE,          .           .           .  .  .     199 

XVII.  THE  ECCENTRIC  LOOM,  .           .           .           .  .  .213 


LIST    OF   ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Washing  the  Terrible  Train,  half  drowned  and  spluttering,  out  into  the 

air.     (Coloured.)  ......        Frontispiece. 

PAGE 

A  Train  that  would  climb  the  Church  Steeple  and  spin  the  Weather  Vane.  29 
His  faithful  Train  supported  him  by  doing  acrobatic  tricks  for  tourists. 

(Heading).      ........        31 

The  Train  coiled  itself  up  in  the  Orchestra,  and,  lazily  thumping  its  tail 

against  the  Balconies,  it  fell  asleep.  .....        38 

A  gallant  charge  of  Rocking-chairs  attacked  the  carters.  (Coloured.)  .  40 
The  Furniture  formed  in  line  and  marched  silently  to  the  Park  (Head'g).  41 
At  twelve  o'  clock  the  Doors  of  the  Houses  slowly  opened.  .  .  44 

The  express  Elevator  flew  through  the  house  high  into  the  air.     .  .        53 

At  the  end  of  the  main  corridor  was  a  shaft  in  which  lived  Three  Elevators. 

(Heading.)  ,  ......         55 

"  Come  on  and  help  !    I  can't  hold  on  it  much  longer  ! "  said  the  strong 

Elevator.         ..*.....        58 
The   Piano,  standing  beneath  the  long  arms  of  his  beloved  Windmill, 

would  serenade  her  plaintively.     (Coloured.)  .  .  .62 

The  Piano  tore  out  a  few  heavy  wires  and  threw  them  as  far  as  he  could. 

(Heading).      ........        63 

The  Very  Grand  Piano  made  his  way,  with  the  help  of  a  Road  Engine,  to 

the  Windmill.  .......        67 

Suddenly  the  Telegraph  poles  closed  around  him.  .  .  .  .71 

The  Fire  Engine,  with  a  laugh,  sent  a  stream  of  water  through  its  win- 
dow.    (Heading.)      .......        73 

He  was  severely  scolded  by  the  Mayor  o'  Ligg.     .  .  .  .78 


12       LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS. 


PAGE 


The  Cannons  now  began  firing  at  everything  in  sight.  (Coloured.)  .  82 
The  Cannons  lay  about  the  fortifications,  wheezing  and  sneezing  and 

coughing.     (Heading.)          ......         83 

One  after  another  the  Guns  were  dismounted.       .  .  .  .88 

The  Hansom,  with  a  terrible  jerk,  threw  his  shaft  upward  and  tossed  the 

horse  high  into  the  air.          ......        93 

The  Cab  Wheels  began  to  revolve,  and  they  began  to  sail  up  the  river  like 

a  new  sort  of  steamboat.  (Heading.)  .  .  .  -95 

The  last  thing  the  Hansom  saw  of  the  mill  it  was  disappearing  into  the 

forest,  a  half  mile  away.         ......       101 

The  Locomotive  hoisted  the  Steamboat  on  top  of  his  cab,  and  set  out 

across  the  fields.  (Coloured.)  .....  104 
At  midnight  the  Locomotive  got  on  board  the  Steamboat,  and  she 

steamed  slowly  up  the  river.  (Heading.)  .  .  .  105 

The  Balloon  then  rose,  and  the  Locomotive  and  the  Steamboat  were 

hoisted  high  in  the  air.         .  .  .  .  .  .       no 

The  Locomotive  finally  succeeded  in  climbing  a  tall  tree.  .  .no 

It  was  impossible  to  get  the  Brig  round  the  corner.  .  .  .117 

The  Brig  went  forward  easily,  under  full  sail.  (Heading.)  .  .  119 

The  Brig  dipped  her  bowsprit  under  the  wheel  of  the  Steam  Roller  and 

pushed  till  she  had  got  the  machine  up  the  bank.  .  .  .122 

The  Church  hid  behind  a  clump  of  trees  to  see  the  little  House  swimming 

in  her  sleep!     (Coloured.)     .  .  .  .  .  .130 

The  little  House  had  always  behavejcj  with  the  greatest  propriety. 

(Heading.)     ........       131 

The  two  dripping,  purple  buildings  embraced  each  other  with  touching 

fondness.        .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .135 

The  City  Clocks  used  to  make  faces  at  him,  but  he  paid  them  well  for 

that  by  twisting  their  hands  round  the  wrong  way.  .  .  141 

Slowly,  his  silken  bag  filled  with  gas,  and  his  strength  returned. 

(Heading.)      .  .  .  .  .  .  ,  .       143 


LIST    OI<     ILLUSTRATIONS.       13 


PAGE 


"  How  do  you  do  ?  "  said  the  Sewing-machine,  "  and  who  are  you  ?  "  .  147 
Wading  in  boldly,  they  carefully  pushed  their  way  through  the  waves. 

(Coloured.)  .  .  .  .  .  .  .152 

The  Lampposts  on  Queer  Street  were  the  most  disorderly  in  the  City  o' 

Ligg.     (Heading.)     .  .  .  .  .  .  .153 

As  they  reached  the  harbour,  the  Lampposts  became  exceedingly  ill.  .  156 
A  maroon-enamelled  machine  shot  after  her,  at  a  terrific  speed.  .  163 

Mr.  Diamond  Frame  was  proud  of  his  family  and  his  connections. 

(Heading.)      ........       165 

She  found  her  lover  disgracefully  lurching  round  the  rink,  under  the 

weight  of  a  fat  man,  learning  to  ride  !  .  .  .  .166 

The  Stable  stuck  there,  pierced  through  by  the  spire,  impaled  an  hun- 
dred feet  high  above  the  street.  (Coloured.)  .  .  .174 
The  Stable  rose  steadily  in  the  air,  like  a  balloon  !  (Heading.)  .  .  175 
It  was  their  firm  belief  that  the  Stable  devoured  horses.  .  .  .176 
He  opened  the  door  and  stepped  out  into  the  studio  to  tell  the  others 

about  it.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .185 

He  stood  on  his  head.     (Heading.)  .  .  .  .  .       187 

He  sank  on  a  painted  imitation  balustrade.  .  .  .  .190 

The  Train  gave  a  tremendous  leap  into  the  air  and  hurdled  the  Bridge.  .  199 
It  was  not  a  good,  honest  Suspension  Bridge,  hung  from  wire  cables,  but 

was  supported  by  iron  rods  and  straps.  (Heading.)  .  .  201 

The  Crane  picked  up  the  carriages  one  by  one  and  tossed  them  into  the 

river.  ........      206 

He  led  them  over  to  No.  7,  and  the  Mayor  and  Yak  looked  curiously  at 

the  roll  of  Tapestry.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .211 

The  Mayor  laughed.  "  That  is  a  crazy  design,  isn't  it  ?  "  said  the 

Mayor.     (Heading.)  ......      213 

Yak  had  been  cutting  up  the  Tapestry  and  had  it  spread  out  on  the  floor 

and  walls.  .  .  .  .  .216 


PREFACE 


THERE  is  no  mistake  more  common  in  everyday  life, 
than  that  which  transposes  cause  for  effect;  and  it  is  no- 
where more  common  than  in  our  conception  of  Inanimate 
Objects.  We  say  that  because  Objects  are  inanimate, 
therefore  they  are  not  intelligent  ;  whereas  the  proper 
reasoning  would  affirm  that  because  they  are  not  intelli- 
gent, therefore  they  are  not  animated.  This  casuistry, 
however,  does  not  carry  us  far  afield,  since  most  are  will- 
ing to  accept  without  challenge  the  fact  that  such  objects 
are,  in  point  of  fact,  neither  animated  nor  intelligent.  It 
is  only  when  we  push  the  investigation  toward  the 
speculation  as  to  whether  or  not  they  ever  existed  in  any 
other  condition,  that  opinions  diverge. 

It  is  remarkable  what  slow  progress  has  been  made  in 


i8      THE     LIVELY    CITY    O'LIGG. 


this  question  since  its  partial  discussion  by  Mrs.  Walker.  1 
Her  essay  upon  the  Total  Depravity  of  Inanimate  Things* 
broke  the  first  ground,  but  subsequent  attempts  to  pursue 
the  matter  have  been  few  and  fitful.  Mrs.  Walker,  indeed 
proceeded  in  the  most  unscientific  and  loose  manner,  and 
contented  herself  with  an  analysis  of  a  minor  consideration, 
a  specialised  detail  of  the  characteristics  of  Inanimate  Ob- 
jects, missing  the  opportunity  of  being  the  first  to  formulate 
the  theory  that  such  objects  do  or  did  actually  possess  more 
or  less  highly  developed  characteristics,  manners  and 
customs,  of  which  their  total  depravity  is  but  one  evidence. 
It  is  not  too  late,  then,  to  go  back  to  the  main  point 
at  issue,  and  assemble  the  main  evidences  of  what  may  be 
called  character,  in  the  Unnatural  Science  of  the  whole 
genera.  To  be  comprehensive,  to  catalogue  all  the  data 
bearing  upon  the  subject,  would  extend  unduly  the  limits 
of  such  an  essay  as  this,  and  therefore,  only  a  few  of  the 
many  various  phases  of  the  subject  will  be  taken  up  ; 
enough  to  prove  indubitably  the  thesis,  but  leaving  to 
subsequent  investigators  the  collocation  of  the  myriad 
facts  necessary  to  establish  the  definitive  and  exhaustive 
deductions  that  shall  formulate  and  classify  all  inanimate 
phenomena. 


*"The  Total  Depravity  of  Inanimate  Things,"  by  Mrs.  E.  A.  Walker.    ''Little 
Classics  "  Series,— Volume  V.  "  Laughter." 


PREFACE.  19 

The  three  most  convincing  proofs  that  such  an  unnat- 
ural science  does  exist,  and  that,  whatever  their  present 
condition,  inanimate  objects  are  derived  from  similar 
objects  possessing  animation  in  a  more  or  less  developed 
state,  from  which  condition  they  have,  in  the  supremacy 
of  Man,  degenerated,  are  as  follows  : 

I.  Evidences    of    prehistoric    animation,    shown     by 
Etymology,  in  the  gender  of  words  in  foreign  languages, 
and  English  idiom,  etc. 

II.  Evidences  of  a  comatose  or  degenerate  animation 
in  the  Objects  themselves. 

III.  Evidences  of  degenerate  functions  and  features  in 
Architecture. 

i.  We  have  only  to  inspect  the  empirical  use  of  gender 
in  French  and  other  substantives,  to  be  confronted  imme- 
diately with  a  paradox  which  the  affirmation  of  this 
thesis  alone  can  explain.  The  English  language  has,  it 
is  true,  discarded  the  old  categories,  but  that,  it  might 
be  said,  en  passant,  is  but  another  example  of  the  hard 
and  fast  literalness  of  our  tongue,  its  radical  spirit,  con- 
stantly changing  to  the  spirit  of  new  conditions,  its  dis- 
regard for  derivation  and  analogy ;  in  a  word,  its 
wonderful  power  of  growth.  We  need  only  go  back  one 
step  to  the  French,  however,  to  find  the  evidences  which 
English  Etymology  has  been  in  such  haste  to  conceal. 


20       THE    LIVELY    CITYO'    LIGG. 

In  French,  then,  we  have  the  following  Objects,  for 
example,  classed  as  Masculine  :  Balloon,  Piano,  Train, 
Cannon,  Cab,  Mill,  and  Boat ;  while  other  things  are 
designated  as  Feminine,  such  as  House,  Chair,  Table, 
Locomotive,  Church,  Stable,  and  Lantern. 

Obviously,  where  there  is  evidence  of  sex,  there  must 
have  been  life,  one  being  a  function  of  the  other,  and  the 
inevitable  conclusion  is  that  at  some  period  of  their  exist- 
ence, all  these  Objects, and  many  others,  must  have  been 
known  to  be,  or  to  have  been,  animate  as  late  as  the  rise 
of  the  Romance  tongues. 

At  first  glance  the  German  Language  seems  to  con- 
tain evidences  of  a  transitionary  state,  and,  to  mark  the 
first  abandonment  of  the  old  tradition  that  objects  had 
been  once  alive,  we  find  the  use  of  the  neuter  gender, 
so  called,  to  distinguish  many  objects,  as  well  as  a  double 
use  of  masculine  and  feminine.  For  instance,  we  have 
three  words  for  Mill  :  Meizel,  (Masculine)  Muehle  (fem- 
inine) and  Hammerwerk,  (Neuter).  The  superficial 
explanation  would  doubtless  be,  that  with  the  growing 
distrust  in  the  early  legends,  the  genders  of  objects  had  be- 
come confused  in  the  Teutonic  mind,  newly  freed  from  the 
strict  empire  of  this  theory,  and  become  lax  and  inaccurate, 
and  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  increasing  use  of  the  neuter 

o 

form  played  havoc  with  the  former  recognised  distinction. 


PREFACE.  21 

Indeed,  it  is  only  fair  to  say,  this  view  is  strenghtened  by 
the  fact  that  many  words  masculine  in  French  are  femi- 
nine in  German, — Cannon,  Boat,  for  instance,  to  cite  from 
our  previous  list,  where,  too,  the  reverse  case  may  be 
exemplified  as  well. 

A  deeper  reasoning,  however,  will  convince  one  that 
this  theory  is  not  inadequate,  and  it  is  impossible  to  escape 
the  more  comprehensive  explanation  that  this  double 
form  in  so  many  substantives  proves  a  much  more 
reasonable  state  of  things,  i.  e.,  that  objects  in  their 
animate  state  had  highly  developed  sexual  distinctions, 
even  amongst  things  of  the  same  sort.  In  fine,  there  were 
doubtless  male  and  female  houses,  mills,  and  pianos,  &c., 
as  might  naturally  be  inferred  a  priori.  Thus  the  Ger- 
man Genders  hark  back  to  the  primeval  knowledge  of 
mankind  even  more  clearly  than  the  French,  the  Teu- 
tonic imagination  and  poetic  insight  retaining  faith  in 
the  early  myths  long  after  it  had  crystalised  into  an 
empirical  dogma  amongst. the  Gauls. 

But  though  we  have  not  these  convincing  evidences 
in  English  etymology,  our  native  idiom  preserves  many 
traces  of  the  folk,  or  rather  the  object-lore  of  our 
ancestors.  We  still  speak  of  the  legs  of  a  chair,  of  the 
arms  of  a  sofa,  the  back  of  a  settee,  the  hands  of  a  watch. 
It  is  idle  to  controvert  the  obvious  inference  by  suppos- 


22     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

ing  these  to  have  been  named  merely  by  resemblances  of 
form.  Does  the  leg  of  a  table  resemble  in  any  way  the 
leg  of  a  man  or  a  horse  ?  No  !  it  undoubtedly  was  so 
named,  far  back  in  the  early  days  of  the  race,  because  at 
one  time  tables  had  legs,  with  which  they  stood,  walked, 
ran  and  kicked.  In  the  same  way  it  is  not  uncommon, 
even  nowadays,  to  hear  that  highly  suggestive  idiom  : 
"the  lamp  has  gone  out,"  and  the  craftsmen,  who  per- 
haps preserve  more  of  the  old  words  and  phrases  than  any 
other  class,  still  speak  of  the  "  teeth "  of  saws,  the 
"  heads  "  of  nails,  the  "  eyes  "  of  needles  :  the  printer 
"  feeds"  his  press  ;  we  speak  of  a  piano  as  "  grand  "  or 
"  upright,"  we  even  distinguish  "  bell  "  buoys.  These 
are  only  a  few  of  a  thousand  cases  that  might  be  cited  in 
support  of  the  theory. 

2.  The  evidence  of  degenerate  functions  or  even 
actions  of  Inanimate  Objects  has  been  too  well  shown, 
in  the  above-mentioned  essay,  to  need  much  elaboration 
here.  The  reader  is  referred  to  that  work,  and,  his  eyes 
once  opened  to  the  bearing  of  its  evidence  upon  the  higher 
issues  involved,  he  may  easily  read  into  the  text,  a  full 
exposition  of  the  importance  of  such  phenomena,  in  their 
bearing  upon  the  case.  Many  other  manifestations 
might  be  adduced,  such  as  the  table-tipping  of  Spiritual- 
ists, never  before  accounted  for  by  this  simple  explana- 


PREFACE.  23 

tion,  the  shutting  of  doors,  and  the  ease  with  which 
small  articles  get  lost.  A  ball  left  standing  upon  the 
slope  of  a  hill,  will  run  down  to  the  bottom.  The  clock 
moves  its  hands,  strikes,  and  goes  slow  or  fast  ;  all 
objects  grow  old.  If  these  instances  are  not  conclusive, 
further  multiplication  of  cases  is  futile. 

3.  Not  the  least  interesting,  though  perhaps  not  the 
most  conclusive,  evidence  of  a  previous  state  of  animation 
in  Inanimate  Objects  is  to  be  found  in  Architecture. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  houses  were  the  most  highly 
organised,  as  well  as  the  first  and  best  known  objects 
with  which  Primeval  Man  was  familiar.  The  esteem 
with  which  dwellings  were  held  by  the  descendants  of  the 
cave-dwellers  is  evidenced  in  the  earliest  attempts  to 
imitate  houses,  and  it  is  a  remarkable  and  conclusive  fact, 
that  as  yet  no  single  house  built  by  our  primitive  ancestors, 
however  remote,  has  been  foitnd  that  does  not  possess 
some  sort  of  rude  elementary  door,  and  indeed,  as  far 
back  as  the  Lake  dwellings,  we  have  abundant  corrob- 
oration  of  the  fact  that  windows  were  not  unknown  ! 

The  door  and  window,  in  fact,  were  persistent  elements 
in  all  ancient  Architecture.  We  can  trace  the  influence 
of  the  original  idea  through  the  Roman,  Egyptian, 
Greek,  Byzantine,  and  Renaissance  periods,  down  to  the 
very  end  of  the  Victorian  Era.  What  does  this  mean  ? 


24     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

There  is  scarcely  any  doubt  but  that,  in  the  original 
Animate  Objects,  the  door  was  by  way  of  being  the 
mouth  of  the  house,  and  it  was  but  natural  that  Primitive 
Man,  to  whom  food  was  the  most  important  need  of  his 
savage  life,  emphasised  the  organ  of  Eating  in  his 
earliest  attempts  at  architecture.  Next  to  subsistence 
came  the  necessity  for  Seeing.  Self  Defence  demanded 
an  eye,  hence  the  window,  the  eyes  of  the  extinct 
Houses.  We  have  just  seen  how  these  canons  came 
down  to  us  and  how  in  the  development  of  Architecture 
they  were  never  wholly  lost  sight  of.  Indeed,  one  need 
only  to  look  at  a  modern  house  to  recognise  the  rea- 
sonableness of  this  hypothesis. 

This  much  is  too  apparent  to  need  further  proof,  and 
few  will  have  the  temerity  to  deny  the  glaring  probabili- 
ties of  the  case,  but  the  unnatural  scientist  will  look 
farther,  and  see  a  host  of  corroborative  details.  The 
most  striking,  as  well  as  one  of  the  least-known  phrases 
lies  in  what  might  be  called  the  "  expression  "  of  houses, 
irrespective  of  any  marked  similarity  to  human  beings. 
This  is  what  architects  term  "design."  It  is  enough  to 
say  that  certain  houses  have  an  anxious,  some  an  uneasy, 
and  others  a  generous,  reposeful  aspect.  Our  poets  are 
fond  of  describing  church  steeples  as  "  fingers  pointing 
Heavenward."  The  illustration,  and  the  whole  miscon- 


PREFACE.  25 

ceived  personification  is  ill-described,  but  it  exemplifies  a 
state  of  things  well  understood  by  the  imaginative. 

Could  space  be  afforded,  proofs  might  also  be  added 
from  mythology  and  the  sacred  writings  of  early  literature. 
We  will  not  insult  our  readers'  intelligence,  however,  by 
burdening  a  volume  of  proof  already  overwhelming. 

It  is  unfortunate,  that,  in  this  mechanical  age,  most 
objects  have  lost  more  and  more  of  those  characteristics 
which  were  common  to  all  before  their  cidivation.  It 
may  be  said  broadly,  however,  that  the  nearer  an  Object 
approaches  an  art,  the  stronger  is  its  personality,  what- 
ever be  its  powers  of  will.  The  piano  is  a  familiar 
instance,  with  its  gracefully  curved  legs,  which  once  were 
capable  of  dignified  locomotion,  and  its  voice,  now  pro- 
voked only  at  the  discretion  of  the  musician.  The 
Camera  has  other  pronounced  characteristics  and  quali- 
ties, and  a  certain  curious  dignity  of  its  own,  despite  its 
absurd  three  legs  (a  rudimentary  fourth  being  often 
noticed),  and  the  early  over-development  of  its  eye  will 
occur  to  every  intelligent  thinker. 

It  is  not  within  the  scope  of  this  article  to  discuss  the 
causes  which  led  to  the  degeneracy  of  this  strange  race 
of  objects,  the  means  by  which  their  freedom  was  sub- 
verted by  Man,  or  the  scope  and  locus  of  its  original  civ- 
ilisation. 


26       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

Less  apropos  even  than  interesting  this  balance  of 
power  is  the  consideration  of  the  possibility  of  the  cross- 
ing of  the  two  equi-dominant  races  or  species,  as  hinted 
in  the  analogies  of  the  biped  beasts  of  mythology.  Here, 
however,  the  reader  may  investigate  for  himself  and 
amuse  himself  with  speculations  upon  the  Equus  Cabal- 
lustrade,  the  Liano  or  Piano  Lion,  the  Giraffopost  and 
other  strange  mongrels.  There  was  doubtless  a  stage 
in  the  progress  of  the  two  races,  when  animals  and  ob- 
jects existed  contemporaneously,  and  were  equipped  with 
approximately  equal  powers,  and  it  is  to  this  era  that  the 
mise  en  seine  of  the  tales  in  this  book  belongs.  But 
the  one  was  destined  to  go  on  and  perfect  a  still  higher 
culture,  while  the  other  had  already  passed  its  summa- 
tion of  development,  and  was  degenerating.  The 
struggle  must  have  been  furious,  though  probably  of 
short  duration,  and  the  laws  of  Evolution  triumphed. 
We  can  have  no  doubt  but  that  it  was  a  survival  of  the 
fittest. 


THE    TERRIBLE    TRAIN. 


ABOUT  twenty-one  miles  outside  of  the  City  o'  Ligg, 
there  was  a  long,  narrow,  dark,  slimy  tunnel  like  a  worm- 
hole  in  the  hills — such  a  terrible  tunnel  that  no  one  had 
ever  ventured  inside  for  more  than  a  few  steps,  and  then 
only  by  daylight.  By  night,  no  one  had  ever  dared  go 
near  this  awful  round  hole  at  all,  for  in  it  lived  a  fearful, 
fierce  and  furious  railway  train,  the  most  terrific  train 
that  ever  was.  It  had  once  been  harmless  enough,  and 
had  carried  many  a  load  of  passengers  from  the  seaside 
up  to  the  City  o'  Ligg,  but  long  ago  it  had  escaped  from 
the  railway  station,  and  had  run  away  into  the  hills,  so 
that  it  should  not  have  to  work. 

The  tunnel  was  so  narrow  that,  when  inside,  the  train 
could  n  f  turn  itself  round,  and  one  could  hear  it  roaring 
and  hlosi  deep  in  the  dark  inside  of  the  hill,  grumbling 


32     THE    LIVELY    CITY    Of    LIGG. 

like  a  dragon.  From  time  to  time  it  would  stick  its  head 
out  of  the  hole  in  the  hillside,  and  whistle  with  wild,  hor- 
rible shrieks,  and  spit  fire  and  steam  out  of  its  smoke- 
stack, and  cough  out  volumes  of  black  smoke,  in  a  way  to 
terrify  the  people  for  miles  around. 

lt  was  an  English  train,  all  jointed  together  with  little 
coaches.  Its  head  was  an  old-style  locomotive,  with  a 
closed  cab  like  a  monkey's  ears.  Its  thorax  was  com- 
posed of  first-class  compartment  carriages,  its  abdomen 
of  second  and  third-class  carriages,  and  it  had  a  tail  like  a, 
scorpion — a  little,  stumpy  brake-van  that  wobbled  from 
side  to  side  and  would  never  stay  on  the  line.  From 
nose  to  tail  the  train  was  all  of  a  whitish  yellow,  like  a 
slug  having  faded  and  bleached  by  living  in  the  darkness 
of  the  tunnel  for  so  many  years. 

The  train  looked  for  all  the  world  like  a  big  snake, 
especially  when  it  came  out  at  night  to  eat  fences  ;  for, 
as  the  neighbours  had  taken  up  the  rails  leading  into  the 
tunnel,  it  had  to  hump  itself  along  like  an  immense  inch- 
worm,  covering  an  eighth  of  a  mile  at  each  hump  !  As 
it  worked  its  way  along,  it  waved  its  yellow  locomotive 
head  from  side  to  side,  and  its  shrieks  frightened  every 
person  in  the  country  into  his  house,  there  to  look,  with 
white  face,  from  the  third  story  windows,  trembling,  till 
the  monster  had  passed,  and  had  gone  back  into  his 


THE    TERRIBLE    TRAIN.          33 

tunnel  to  sleepily  digest  a  few  miles  of  picket-fence  in 
peace. 

Now,  many  rewards  had  been  offered  by  the  Mayor  of 
the  City  o'Ligg  for  the  capture  of  the  terrible  train,  but 
for  a  long,  long  time  no  one  had  dared  even  to  think  of 
attempting  such  a  dangerous  feat.  But  there  was  in 
town  a  little  boy  named  Yak,  very  valourous  and  high- 
spirited,  who  had  set  his  wits  to  work  upon  the  problem, 
till  at  last  a  p;ood  idea  crawled  into  his  small  head. 

o 

So  one  day  he  painted  himself  with  black  paint  from 
head  to  foot,  so  that  he  could  not  be  seen  in  the  dark. 
He  took  a  bag  of  jam  sandwiches,  and  he  crawled  into 
the  tunnel,  to  spend  the  day  in  watching  the  train. 
After  he  had  got  in  a  few  miles,  he  heard  the  muffled  hiss 
of  the  engine's  pistons,  and  he  flattened  himself  against 
the  side  of  the  tunnel,  and  edged  along  in  perfect  silence. 
It  was  an  anxious  moment,  for  i'f  he  should  come  across 
the  head  of  the  train,  it  would  be  certain  death,  because 
he  knew  that  the  train  would  chase  him  and  eat  him  up 
before  he  could  get  away. 

Suddenly»his  foot  slipped  and  he  fell  against  the  tail 
of  the  train,  hitting  the  brake-van  that  was  wagging  away 
very  contentedly.  Yak's  heart  jumped,  and  he  gave  him- 
self up  for  lost ;  but  seeing  that  the  train  had  either  not 
noticed  the  blow,  or  had  thought  it  was  only  some  little 


34     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

hand-car  that  had  ventured  in,  he  worked  himself  along- 
side the  carriages  till,  round  a  curve,  he  saw  a  flicker,  and 
there  was  the  train  eating  away,  with  its  little  head-light 
flashing  first  on  one  side  of  the  tunnel  and  then  on  the 
other !  The  side  walls  were  black  and  shiny  masses  of 
rock.  It  was  as  Yak  had  expected — the  train  was  eating 
its  dinner  of  anthracite  coal ! 

As  the  boy  watched,  he  accidentally  touched  a  second, 
class  carriage  in  the  train's  most  sensitive  and  ticklish 
spot.  With  a  roar  and  a  loud,  screaming  whistle,  it  be- 
gan to  writhe  bajkwards  to  get  at  the  intruder,  but  Yak 
turned  and  ran  for  his  life,  and  reached  the  mouth  of  the 
tunnel  just  in  time  to  escape  being  crushed  under  the 
wheels. 

In  spite  of  the  danger,  however,  Yak  crawled  into  the 
tunnel  the  next  day  and  the  next,  to  watch  the  train  eat- 
ing its  dinner  of  anthracite  coal.  He  had  the  good  luck 
never  to  encounter  the  head  of  the  train,  which  would 
undoubtedly  have  bitten  him  into  little  pieces,  or  even 
swallowed  him  whole.  The  last  day  he  went  in  was  a 
Sunday,  when  he  found  the  train  feeding  at  a  new  place, 
and  Yak  saw,  by  the  look  of  the  dull  black  walls  of  the 
tunnel,  that  this  was  where  the  train  kept  his  soft,  bitu- 
minous coal.  There  was  so  little  of  it  that  the  train  kept 
it  only  for  Sundays,  for  soft  coal  was  considered  a  great 
delicacy  by  this  greedy  train. 


THE  TERRIBLE  TRAIN.  35 

Now  that  Yak  was  siu'e  of  the  train's  weakness,  he  laid 
his  plans  boldly,  and,  with  the  help  of  the  Mayor  o'  Ligg, 
and  a  million  labourers,  he  laid  a  line  from  the  City 
o'  Ligg  to  the  mouth  of  the  tunnel,  and  spread  the  track 
very  thickly  with  a  layer  of  soft,  bituminous  coal.  But  to 
get  the  train  to  turn  around,  so  that  it  should  come  out 
head  first  upon  the  line — that  was  the  question  ! 

The  far  end  of  the  tunnel  came  out  of  the  hill  by  the 
side  of  a  river,  where  Yak  had  often  seen  the  train  come 
to  drink,  and  so  here  the  boy  and  the  Mayor  came,  with 
their  million  men.  They  dug  and  they  delved  for  many 
nights  and  many  days,  till  they  had  dammed  the  stream, 
and  made  a  new  channel  leading  from  the  river  to  the 
mouth  of  the  tunnel.  When,  at  last,  all  was  ready,  they 
waited  till  the  train  had  gone  into  the  tunnel  after  drink- 
ing one  evening  and  then  turned  the  stream  into  the  por- 
tal, and  it  rushed  through  the  hole  in  the  hill  like  a 
deluge,  washing  the  terrible  train,  half  drowned  and 
spluttering,  head  foremost,  out  into  the  open  air,  along- 
side the  new  laid-line.  The  train,  which  had  not  had  a 
bath  for  many,  many  years,  took  it  a  good  deal  more 
good-humouredly  than  might  have  been  expected,  and, 
shaking  itself  till  the  water  was  spattered  over  the 
countryside  like  a  thunderstorm,  it  crawled  upon  the  em- 
bankment, and  began  to  eat  the  soft  coal,  as  if  nothing 
disturbing  had  happened. 


36     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

When  it  had  eaten  all  it  could  burn,  it  slowly  backed 
into  the  tunnel  again  and  slept  all  night,  snoring  loudly. 
It  came  out  every  day  after  that,  rolling  along  the  rails, 
and  eating  a  little  more  coal  each  time,  getting  gradually 
farther  and  farther  from  its  tunnel,  till,  in  three  weeks 
it  had  boldly  entered  the  City  o'  Ligg  ! 

Now,  the  end  of  the  line  led  into  the  Grand  Opera 
House,  and  precisely  a  month  after  its  bath,  the  train 
puffed  into  the  building,  heavy  with  coal,  and  coiling  it- 
self up  in  the  orchestra  and  lazily  thumping  its  tail 
against  the  balconies,  it  fell  fast  asleep  ! 

In  a  moment  the  doors  were  bolted.  Then,  telling  the 
Mayor  that  the  rest  was  easily  done,  Yak  ran  home  and 
went  to  bed,  for  he  had  not  had  a  good  night's  sleep  for 
a  month. 

When  he  re-entered  the  Grand  Opera  House,  the  train 
was  lying  in  a  stupor,  its  tail  limp,  and  its  little  head-light 
dull  and  smoky.  Yak  seated  himself  beside  the  locomo- 
tive and  softly  stroked  its  head.  As  the  train  slowly 
awoke,  it  felt  the  little  boy  oiling  its  wheels,  and  quietly 
rubbing  the  connecting-rods,  and  polishing  the  brasses 
and  boiler  of  its  locomotive.  This  kindness  was  too 
affecting  for  the  train  to  resist ;  its  engine  would  not 
snort  and  its  bell  rang  very  softly,  so  as  not  to  frighten 
its  little  friend.  Yak  came  every  day  to  see  the  train, 


THE    TERRIBLE    TRAIN.  37 

and  at  last  the  monster  grew  so  tame  that  it  would  eat 
out  of  the  boy's  hand. 

The  train  was  now  released  from  the  Opera  House  and 
all  the  citizens  of  the  City  o'  Ligg  came  out  to  welcome 
it  and  its  little  master.  All  praised  its  docility.  The 
little  girls  brought  garlands  of  roses  and  hung  them 
round  its  neck,  and  the  ladies  of  the  town  trimmed  it  with 
flags,  while  the  men  painted  it  freshly  with  white  and 
gold.  It  was  pointed  out  to  all  the  railway  stations  as  a 
model  of  deportment. 

The  train  never  outgrew  its  love  for  its  little  master, 
Yak,  and  it  became  his  especial  pet,  carrying  him  to 
school  every  day,  and  waiting  for  him  under  the  trees 
until  he  was  ready  to  return  home.  It  would,  however, 
never  allow  any  of  the  other  children  on  its  back  ;  it 
would  gently  but  firmly  shake  them  off,  whenever  they 
attempted  to  steal  a  ride.  Long  after  Yak  grew  too  old 
to  work,  his  faithful  train  supported  him  by  doing  acro- 
batic tricks  for  tourists  in  the  City  o'  Ligg,  and  many 
strangers  brought  away  with  them  strange  and  improba- 
ble tales  of  a  train  that  would  stand  on  its  head  for  a 
>enny,  or  climb  the  church  steeple  and  spin  the  weather 
vane  for  their  amusement. 

At  last  the  train  died.  It  was  a  sad  and  cruel  death, 
caused  by  a  malicious  little  boy,  who  was  jealous  of  Yak's 


38     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O '    LIGG. 


reputation  as  a  train-tamer.  He  found  the  train  alone 
one  night,  on  a  siding,  and,  after  uncoupling  all  the 
carriages,  shunted  them  around  to  different  parts  of  the 
station  yard.  The  next  morning  help  was  sent  for,  but, 


GELETT  BURGESS 


by  a  fearful  mistake,  the  train  was  put  together  wrongly, 
with  all  the  third-class  carriages  next  the  locomotive  !  It 
had  much  trouble  in  digesting  even  the  softest  coke  or 
wood  after  this,  and  at  last  it  came  to  a  standstill  upon  a 
suspension  bridge,  and  never  moved  again. 


THE    RUNAWAY    CHAIRS. 


GELETT    BURQE55 


\\ 


IT  was  a  sly  old  rocking-chair  that  began  it,  but  the 
conspiracy  spread  so  quickly  all  over  the  City  o'  Ligg 
that  all  the  furniture  must  have  been  quite  ready  for  the 
plot. 

"  I  have  been  sat  upon  quite  enough  !  "  said  the  rocker ; 
"  not  to  speak  of  the  horrid  men  that  put  their  feet  in  my 
lap." 

"  I  don't  see  why  you  should  care  if  they  put  their  feet 
on  you,"  a  pert  little  foot-stool  replied.  "  For  my  part,  I 
think,  it's  low  of  them  to  sit  on  me  ;  you  were  made  for 
that,  but  I  wasn't  ! " 

"  At  all  events,"  the  old  sofa  grumbled,  "  only  one  can 
sit  on  you  at  a  time — you  needn't  complain.  What 
would  you  do  if  a  half  dozen  of  them  tried  to  sit  on  you 
at  once  ?  That's  what  they  do  to  me  !  " 


42      THE    LIVELY    CITY    O '    LIGG. 

"  Well,  they  can't  throw  you  around  the  room,  and  use 
you  for  a  step-ladder  or  a  table,  anyway  !"  It  was  a 
frisky  young  stool  who  had  interrupted.  "  They  not  only 
put  their  feet  on  me,  but  they  stand  on  me,  too  !  Look 
at  my  rungs — they're  all  barked  and  sore  ;  the  skin's  all 
knocked  off." 

•"  Wait  till  they  break  your  leg  as  they  did  mine,  be- 
fore you  talk,"  said  the  easy  chair.  "  They  gave  my 
arm  an  awful  wrench  yesterday  ;  and,  the  first  thing  I 
know,  I'll  have  to  go  to  the  cabinet-maker's,  and  have  it 
set.  Perhaps  you  know  what  hot  glue  feels  like,  young 
fellow  ?  " 

"  No,  thank  Heaven,  I  don't  ! "  said  the  stool  ;  "  but  I 
have  been  scraped  and  sandpapered  ! " 

"That  doesn't  hurt!"  said  the  table.  "When  they 
begin  to  use  the  plane  on  you,  then  you  can  squeak  ! 
Here  I  am,  with  only  two  castors  to  my  feet.  I  wonder 
how  they'd  like  to  go  without  toes  ?  " 

"  That's  all  right ;  you  don't  have  to  be  upholstered, 
and  tacked  and  sown  up.  Perhaps  it's  fun  to  have  long 
needles  stuck  into  you  every  year  or  so,  and  about  a 
thousand  tacks  driven  in,  and  have  all  your  stuffing 
pulled  out,  just  as  soon  as  it's  flattened  down  easy  in  the 
worn  spots  !  "  The  rocking-chair  tossed  violently  as  it 
spoke,  and  hitched  its  way  over  to  the  stool. 


THE    RUNAWAY    CHAIRS.          43 

"  What  are  you  going  to  do  about  it  ?"  said  the  piano- 
stool,  turning  from  one  to  the  other. 

"  I  have  been  thinking  about  it,  and  I  propose  that  we 
all  strike,  and  send  the  foot-stool  round  through  the 
town  to  notify  all  the  furniture  in  all  the  houses  to  quit 
work,"  the  rocker  said. 

The  plot  was  discussed  and  accepted  forthwith,  and 
that  night  the  little  foot-stool  stole  out  of  doors,  and 
visited  a  dozen  houses.  Up  and  down  the  street  the 
excitement  spread,  and  every  piece  of  furniture  in  the 
City  o'  Ligg  was  at  last  converted,  except  the  pianos. 

"  It's  all  right  for  you  fellows,"  they  said,  "  but  we 
have  no  complaints.  They  don't  dare  abuse  us,  and 
stand  on  us,  or  leave  the  window  open  so  that  we'll  catch 
cold,  for  we're  too  jolly  expensive  !  But  you  go  on,  and 
we  wish  you  good  luck  !  " 

And  so  it  was  decided  that,  on  an  appointed  night, 
every  piece  of  furniture  in  the  City  o'  Ligg  should  run 
away  into  the  woods  outside  the  town.  The  houses, 
after  a  good  deal  of  persuasion,  reluctantly  consented  to 
open  their  doors. 

Now,  the  little  boy  named  Yak  lived  in  the  very  house 
where  the  plot  began,  and  that  night  he  went  to  sleep 
upon  the  old  sofa,  under  a  large  rug.  Why  the  sofa 
never  told. the  others,  was  never  found  out.  Perhaps 


44 


THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 


he  thought  he  would  keep  the  boy  prisoner  as  a  hos- 
tage, perhaps  the  sofa  was  so  heavy  that  he  did  not 
notice  the  extra  weight,  but,  at  any  rate,  Yak  slept  on 
through  all  the  bustle  of  the  runaway,  and  never  woke 
up  until  it  was  all  over. 


It  was  a  strange  sight,  the  migration  of  the  chairs  and 
tables,  that  August  night.  At  twelve  o'clock,  all  over 
the  city  o'  Ligg,  the  doors  of  the  houses  slowly  opened, 
and  creeping  quietly  downstairs  came  lines  of  chairs,  and 
stools,  and  tables,  and  sofas.  As  each  house  was  emptied, 


THE    RUNAWAY    CHAIRS.         45 

the  furniture  formed  in  line  and  marched  silently  to  the 
park  in  the  centre  of  the  town.  The  lamp  posts  waved 
at  them  as  they  passed,  and  the  few  ash-barrels  that  were 
lert  upon  the  streets  rolled  with  laughter  to  see  the 
clumsy  old  pieces  of  furniture  go  by. 

In  the  park  they  were  joined  by  many  benches,  anxious 
to  escape  from  the  work  they  had  t^  do,  not  only  by  day 
but  often  by  night,  when,  at  least,  the  others  might  rest. 
The  rocking-chair  then  divided  the  whole  army  into  divi- 
sions for  the  march. 

First  came  the  little  foot-stools.  After  these  came  the 
three  and  four-legged  stools  and  piano-stools,  who 
creaked  like  a  fife-corps  in  time  with  the  marching  legs 
of  the  straight  chairs  that  followed.  There  were  thou- 
sands of  these  ;  dining-chairs,  parlour  chairs  with  curved 
legs,  stiff  chamber  chairs — stuffed,  padded,  and  cane- 
seated.  The  arm-chairs  and  sofas  came  next,  waddling 
along  heavily,  and  a  regiment  of  tables  brought  up  the 
rear.  Alongside  the  procession  galloped  the  rockers, 
keeping  the  whole  line  moving  in  an 'orderly  fashion,  and 
carrying  orders  back  and  forth.  The  chairs  with  castors 
got  along  very  easily  on  the  paved  streets,  but  when  they 
struck  the  rough  roads  of  the  country,  they  slipped  in 
the  most  ludicrous  fashion. 

The  wood  was  reached  just  as  day  broke,  and  the  whole 


46       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

army  stood  around  amongst  the  trees,  and  rested.  The 
campaign  had  been  a  great  success,  and  they  laughed  to 
think  that  their  days  of  work  were  over.  As  long  as  they 
could  hide  in  the  forest  they  were  safe. 

It  was  just  as  they  were  congratulating  themselves  on 
their  freedom  that  little  Yak  awoke.  When  he  put  his 
head  out  from  under  the  rug,  he  was  astonished  to  see 
himself  in  the  forest ;  but  when  he  looked  round,  and 
saw  thousands  and  thousands  of  chairs  and  tables  and 
sofas,  he  could  not  believe  his  eyes.  The  old  rocker  had 
just  begun  to  address  the  assembled  furniture. 

"Fellow  Pieces,"  said  he,  "this  is  all  right  for  a  be- 
ginning, and  we  may  congratulate  ourselves  upon  our 
success,  but  we  have  a  still  greater  duty  to  perform. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  as  soon  as  our  loss  is  discovered, 
other  pieces  of  furniture  will  be  speedily  manufactured 
and  will  be  forced  to  submit  to  the  slavery  from  which 
we  have  escaped.  Can  we  rest  happily  here,  while  our 
new-made  brothers  and  sisters  are  ground  under  the  foot 
of  tyrant  Man  ?" 

"  NO  ! "  cried  all  the  furniture,  as  with  a  single  voice. 

"  No  !"  answered  the  rocker.  "I,  myself,  am  of  the 
solidest  mahogany,  and  I  am  one  of  the  oldest  Shemton 
designs  ;  but  were  I  the  cheapest  veneer,  my  glue  would 
boil  at  such  selfishness.  Let  us  send  emissaries,  then, 


THE    RUNAWAY    CHAIRS.         47 

into  the  town  every  night,  and  teach  these  unfortunates 
how  to  throw  off  the  yoke  !  Who  will  volunteer  for  this 
dangerous  service?" 

Yak  waited  to  hear  no  more.  Luckily  he  was  on  the 
outskirts  <?*  tne  mob,  for  if  he  had  been  observed  he 
would  h£ve  beeir  trodden  to  death  by  the  excited  chairs. 
He  drtPPec*  to, the  ground  and  crawled  out  of  sight,  and 
then  ra1  as  *ast  as^  he  could  for  the  town.  He  found  the 
City  o'  L7JT  ln  '  ^fusion.  It  was  now  noon,  and  nobody 
had  been  able  to  sit  down,  except  upon  the  floor,  since 
early  morning.  He  thought  to  himself  how  terrible  it 
would  have  been  if  the  beds  had  run  away,  also  ! 

The  inhabitants  of  the  city  were  dumfounded  when 
they  discovered  that  there  was  not  a  seat  left  in  the  whole 
town.  They  had  to  eat  their  dinners  from  the  mantle- 
pieces  or  sitting  tailor-wise  on  the  floor,  and  they  could 
not  imagine  what  had  become  of  all  their  furniture.  Yak 
went  directly  to  the  Mayor,  and  told  his  story. 

"  It  is  impossible  that  my  furniture  should  have  been 
so  ungrateful !"  said  the  Mayor.  "  Why,  it  was  only  last 
spring  that  I  gave  every  piece  in  my  house  a  new  coat  of 
varnish  ! " 

"Well,"  said  Yak,  "  there  they  all  are,  and  I  doubt  if 
there  is  much  varnish  left  on  them  by  this  time." 

The  Mayor  was  at   last  convinced  of  the  exodus,  and 


48       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

taking  many  horses  and  many  carts,  waggons,  wains, 
drays,  trucks,  and  vans,  he  went  out  to  the  wood  to  see 
what  could  be  done  about  the  matter.  When  the  pieces 
of  furniture  saw  men  approaching,  they  formed  in  battal- 
ions, and  prepared  to  fight  the  enemy.  Before  the 
Mayor  knew  what  to  expect,  a  gallant  charge  of  rocking- 
chairs  had  attacked  the  carters,  and,  while  they  were  in 
confusion,  platoons  of  heavy  dining-tables  advanced,  and 
began  to  rear  and  kick  so  that  no  man  could  stand  against 
them.  The  solid  mahogany  sofas  cut  off  all  retreat,  and 
before  long  the  Mayor  and  all  his  men  were  surrounded 
by  the  now  infuriated  furniture. 

Although  they  had  won  the  victory,  the  old  rocker  was 
shrewd  enough  to  know  that,  now  their  hiding  place  was 
discovered,  it  was  only  a  question  of  time  when  the 
Mayor  would  be  reinforced  by  a  squadron  of  cabinet 
makers  with  sharp  saws  and  planes  ;  so,  taking  some  of 
the  more  influential  pieces  of  furniture  aside,  he  suggested 
that  a  treaty  be  made  with  the  Mayor  of  the  City  o'  Ligg. 
This  was  agreed  to,  after  much  discussion,  and  the  offer 
was  proposed  to  the  Mayor. 

The  Mayor,- in  his  turn,  wished  to  consult  with  his 
council,  but  the  chairs  refused  to  allow  this.  The  Mayor 
haggled  about  the  terms  of  the  agreement,  but  after  he 
had  hesitated  some  time,  eight  elephantine  billiard  tables, 


THE    RUNAWAY    CHAIRS.          49 

impatient  at  the  delay,  threatened  to  begin  to  kick  with 
their  legs  if  he  did  not  agree  immediately.  And  so  the 
Mayor,  now  quite  terrified,  signed  the  following  agree- 
ment : 

1.  Owners  of  furniture  should  not  put   their  feet  on 
anything  but  foot-stools,  and  should  not  sit  down  on  any- 
thing but  chairs  and  sofas. 

2.  Furniture   should   be   repaired  and  revarnished  as- 
soon  as  possible  after  being  broken  or  scratched. 

3.  Furniture  should  be  upholstered  with  only  the  best 
and  softest  materials,  and  covered  with  good  taste,  gimp 
to  be  glued  on,  and  not  tacked. 

4.  Rocking-chairs  should  have  the  ends  of  all  rockers 
round,  instead  of  pointed,  and  all  other  chairs  to  be  fur- 
nished with  easily-rolling  castors. 

5.  The  sofas  should  not  have  to  hold  more  than  three 
persons,  and  the   twirling  piano-stools   should   be  oiled 
once  a  week. 

6.  All  the  furniture  should  be  carted  back  to  the  City 
o'  Ligg  with  the  honours  of  war. 

And  back  they  were  carried,  indeed,  and  they  drove 
into  the  city  waving  their  legs  from  a  thousand  carts, 
waggons,  wains,  drays,  trucks,  and  vans,  from  which  they 
were  selected  by  their  crestfallen  owners,  and  taken  to 
their  respective  homes.  The  houses  welcomed  them 


50       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

soberly  enough  ;  but  more  than  one  window  winked  its 
shutter,  as  if  to  say,  "  That's  all  right,  but  I  wonder  how 
long  it  will  be  before  my  master  puts  his  feet  on  the 
rungs  of  his  best  white-and-gold  parlour  chairs  again  ?" 


THE    THREE    ELEVATORS. 


THERE  was  one  immense  building  in  the  City  o'  Ligg  ; 
it  was  twenty-seven  stories  high  !  At  the  end  of  the 
main  corridor,  which  was  a  gorgeous  affair,  paved  with 
marble  and  walled  with  malachite,  there  was  a  shaft,  in 
which  lived  three  elevators. 

One  of  these  elevators  was  very,  very  strong.  One 
was  very,  very  swift.  One  was  neither  very  strong  nor 
very  swift,  but  it  made  up  for  it  by  being  very,  very 
clever,  as  you  shall  see. 

The  strong  elevator  was  used  chiefly  for  carrying  up 
heavy  pieces  of  merchandise,  and  was  not  fitted  up  so 
beautifully  as  the  others.  The  swift  one  was  an  "  Express 
Elevator,"  and  did  not  stop  till  he  got  to  the  twentieth 


56       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

story.  If  you  wanted  to  go  to  a  floor  between  that  and 
the  ground  floor,  you  had  to  take  the  one  in  the  middle 
of  the  three,  which  was  the  clever  elevator. 

At  night,  after  the  power  was  turned  off,  the  three 
elevators  rested,  side  by  side  on  the  ground  floor,  at  the 
end  of  the  corridor.  It  was  then  that  they  used  to  gos- 
sip over  the  day's  work,  and  the  strong  one  would  brag 
of  the  heavy  cases  he  had  lifted  ;  the  swift  one  would 
boast  of  how  he  had  made  the  trip  to  the  roof  in  two 
minutes  many  and  many  a  time,  and  could  do  it  in  1:46, 
if  necessary,  with  a  good  elevator  boy  ;  and  the  clever 
one  did  not  say  much,  but  she  would  lead  the  others  on, 
and  keep  them  talking. 

One  day  the  swift  elevator,  who  always  made  the  last 
trip,  dropped  down  to  the  floor  as  the  electric  lights  were 
turned  off,  in  a  great  excitement. 

"  What  do  you  think  ?  "  he  said,  "  a  great,  stupid  house 
has  crawled  on  top  of  this  building  ;  it  is  a  ten-story 
house,  too!" 

"  Heavens  !  Do  you  suppose  we'll  have  to  make 
thirty-seven-story  trips,  now  ?  That  is  too  much  of  a 
good  thing  !  "  said  the  strong  elevator. 

"  I  am  afraid  we  shall,"  said  the  clever  one,  "  unless 
we  can  do  something  about  it,  in  a  hurry  ! " 

"  What  can  we  do  ? "  cried  the  other  two, 


THE    THREE    ELEVATORS.          57 

"  Well,"  said  the  clever  one  to  the  swift  one,  "  if  you 
could  only  go  fast  enough— 

"  Oh,  no  fear,  /  can  go  fast  enough  ;  you  wait  !"  said 
the  swift  elevator,  shaking  her  annunciator  drops. 

"  Or  if  you  were  a  little  stronger,"  continued  the  one 
in  the  centre,  as  she  looked  slyly  at  the  heavy  freight 
car. 

The  strong  one  rattled  his  rope  with  his  chuckles. 
"  Well,  I  think  you  can  trust  me  !  " 

"  Well,  then,  perhaps  we  can  do  it,"  said  the  clever 
little  elevator. 

"  But  how?"  enquired  the  other  two. 

"  Why,  it's  only  necessary  to  push  the  house  off  ;  and 
it  doesn't  matter  whether  you  shoot  up  fast  and  knock  it 
off  with  a  jerk,  or  go  up  slowly,  the  way  old  freightie 
does,  and  push  it  off  by  main  force  ;  it's  all  the  same,  as 
long  as  the  house  falls  off.  I'm  not  very  strong,  and  I'm 
not  very  swift,  but  I  can  see  the  way  it  ought  to  be  done, 
easily  enough." 

Then  the  other  two  consulted  together.  "  Let  me  try 
first !"  said  one,  and  "  No,  let  me  try  first,"  said  the  other, 
till  they  had  to  appeal  to  the  middle  one  to  decide  which 
should  have  the  honour  of  the  first  trial. 

"  Let  the  express  go  first,"  said  the  clever  one,  "  and  if 
he  can't  do  it,  then  the  goods  elevator  may  try  it." 


58       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

So  the  express  elevator  drew  a  long  breath  and  braced 
himself  against  a  floor.  "Go!"  cried  the  others.  He 
shot  up  like  a  bullet  out  of  a  gun,  so  fast  and  so  hard 
that  he  drove  up  and  up,  right  into  the  house  on  top  of 
the  building,  where  there  was  no  shaft,  and  tore  a  hole, 


ten  stories  high,  clear  through  it.  But  his  speed  was  so 
great  that  he  flew  through  the  house,  high  into  the  air, 
and  then  fell  down,  smash !  on  the  roof  of  the  house, 
and  was  killed. 


THE    THREE    ELEVATORS.         59 

"  Now,  it  is  your  turn,"  said  the  clever  one,  smiling 
wickedly. 

The  strong  freight  car  took  a  tight  hold  on  his  rope, 
and  crawled  slowly  up,  story  by  story,  till  he  had  reached 
the  top  of  the  shaft,  at  the  twenty-seventh  floor.  There 
he  rested  a  few  minutes  to  get  his  breath.  Then  he  put 
his  head  against  the  house,  and  exerted  all  his  strength 
in  a  mighty  effort.  He  pushed  and  pushed,  but  though 
he  lifted  the  whole  house  up  about  twenty  feet,  he  could 
do  no  more. 

Then  he  shouted  down  the  shaft  to  the  other  :  "  Come 
on  and  help  !  It's  heavier  than  I  thought,  and  I  can't 
hold  it  much  longer  !  Come  quickly  !  " 

"  I'm  right  here  !  "  said  the  clever  elevator,  who  had 
stolen  up  the  shaft  after  him  ;  "  I'll  help." 

But  instead  of  helping,  that  sly  little  car  crawled  out 
of  the  hole  the  swift  elevator  had  made,  and  crept  along 
the  roof  of  the  building  in  the  space  left  by  the  other's 
holding  up  the  house.  It  was  lucky  for  her  that  the 
stupid  freight  elevator  could  not  see,  for  if  he  had  dropped 
the  house,  it  would  have  crushed  her  flatter  than  a  pan- 
cake. She  was  a  little  frightened,  but  she  got  safely  to 
the  edge,  and  dropped  to  a  roof  near  by,  and  lay  there 
laughing  to  her  own  naughty  little  self. 


6o       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O  *  *L  I  G  G . 

The  strong  elevator  held  up  the  house  as  long  as  he 
could,  and  then  let  it  drop  with  a  groan. 

"  Why  didn't  you  push  more  ?  "  he  said  ;  but  when  he 
came  down  and  found  that  the  clever  one  was  gone,  he 
didn't  know  what  to  make  of  it  at  all.  He  was  a  very 
dull  machine,  and  he  never  knew  what  a  fool  the  sly  one 
had  made  of  them  both. 

But  the  clever  little  car  stayed  up  on  the  roof  in  the 
sun  watching  the  lively  City  o'  Ligg  all  day,  and  slept 
all  night,  thanking  her  ropes  that  she  didn't  have  to 
work  any  more,  and  didn't  "have  to  obey  an  ignorant 
elevator  boy  who  would  stop  her  with  a  jerk,  and  start 
her  with  a  jounce.  And  unless  she  has  been  taken  away 
and  made  into  a  street  car,  she  is  there  yet  ! 


THE    VERY    GRAND    PIANO 


F 

THERE  was  once  a  piano  in  the  City  o'  Ligg,  who  was 
so  very  grand  that,  besides  the  black  and  white  keys  that 
most  pianos  have,  he  possessed  blue  and  red  keys  also, 
on  which  he  could  imitate  the  songs  of  birds,  the  ripple 
of  rivulets,  and  the  laughter  of  little  children. 

But  though  he  was  the  grandest  piano  in  the  City  o* 
Ligg,  he  was  not  at  all  happy.  He  had  fallen  in  love 
with  a  windmill,  who  did  not  encourage  him  !  The 
piano  would  often  gulumph  across  the  fields  of  an  even- 
ing, clumsily  climbing  the  many  walls,  fences,  and  hedges 
on  the  way,  and,  standing  beneath  the  long  arms  of  his 
beloved,  he  would  serenade  her  plaintively  in  A-sharp. 
But  it  would  never  do  any  good  ;  the  windmill  would 
not  notice  him. 

After  years  of  such  futile  devotion,  the  piano  went  to 
call  upon  an  old  church  organ  fo  seek  advice. 


64       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

"  I  know  very  little  of  love,"  said  the  organ,  "  though 
I  am  often  present  at  weddings  ;  but  why  not  try  B-flat 
for  a  change." 

This  seemed  a  good  idea  to  the  piano,  and  that  very 
night  he  stole  out  of  the  music  room,  and  made  his  way 
to  where  the  windmill  lived.  He  struck  up  a  merry, 
frolicking  tune  in  B-flat,  that  should  have  charmed  a 
church  clock.  Indeed,  this  time  the  windmill  did  not 
seem  so  indifferent  to  his  suit.  She  stopped  to  fan  her- 
self, and  turned  her  head  to  look  at  the  piano  ;  but  when 
she  saw  him  squatting  on  three  stumpy,  though  highly 
ornamented  rosewood  legs,  in  the  middle  of  a  ploughed 
field,  she  laughed  aloud. 

This  was  too  much  for  the  Very  Grand  Piano,  and,  shut- 
ting his  lid  with  a  bang,  he  waddled  across  the  field  and 
jumped  into  the  river,  intending  to  drown  himself,  and 
so  forget  his  sorrows  and  perpetual  disappointments. 

He  did  not  drown,  however.  The  river  bore  him, 
floundering,  down  toward  its  mouth,  but  instead  of 
swallowing  him,  it  cast  him  high  and  dry,  on  a  desert 
island,  in  the  harbour.  By  this  time  he  had  decided  to 
live,  in  spite  of  his  sorrows,  and  he  crawled  up  into  the 
sun,  opened  his  cover,  and  dried  his  sounding-board. 

For  many  days  he  was  too  wretched  to  speak,  but  at 
last  the  burden  of  his  misery  was  too  much  to  bear,  and 


THE    VERY    GRAND    PIANO.         65 

he  groaned  and  sang  aloud,  chiefly  in  minor  chords,  upon 
his  blue  keys.  So  he  continued,  bewailing  his  fate,  till, 
one  day,  a  kite  carried  the  story  of  his  sorrow  to  the 
windmill  in  the  field. 

"  Is  he  really  as  serious  and  as  constant  as  all  that  ?  " 
she  said.  "  Perhaps  I  missed  something,  after  all ! " 
And  she  sent  a  message,  by  way  of  the  water-pipe,  with 
whom  she  was  connected  (on  her  mother's  side),  to  let 
the  piano  know  that  she  was  sorry. 

The  water-pipe  gave  the  message  to  the  foghorn,  who 
bawled  it  across  to  the  foolish  old  piano  upon  the  island. 
"  Come  home  !  Come  home  !"  shouted  the  foghorn,  in 
a  hoarse  voice,  across  the  waters  of  the  harbour. 

But  how  was  the  piano  to  get  home?  He  could  not 
swim,  and  there  was  nothing  in  which  to  sail,  for  all  the 
tugs  in  the  harbour  said  it  was  none  of  their  business  if 
the  piano  wanted  to  make  such  a  fool  of  himself,  and 
they  couldn't  be  expected  to  carry  him. 

The  piano  was  now  more  wretched  than  ever,  and  he 
played  on  his  black  keys  all  day  the  most  heartrending 
music  that  ever  was  heard.  The  buoys  bobbled  with 
sympathy  and  excitement,  but  they  had  to  stay  and 
watch  for  ships,  and  so,  of  course,  could  do  nothing. 
Many  weeks  passed  in  this  miserable  way. 

At  last  a  kind   old  steamboat  passed  the  island,  and 


66       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'LIGG 

answered  the  grand  piano's  frantic  signals.  The  steam- 
boat was  willing  to  help,  but  the  water  was  too  shallow 
for  her  to  approach  very  near  the  island,  though  the 
piano,  half  crazed  with  disappointment,  waded  out  as  far 
as  he  dared.  All  hope  seemed  over,  when  the  steamboat 
whistled  :  "  Pull  out  your  strings,  and  throw  them  over 
my  funnels  !  " 

With  a  cry  of  joy,  the  piano  tore  out  a  few  heavy 
wires  and,  tying  them  together,  threw  them  as  far  as  he 
could.  But  no,  they  would  not  reach !  He  tore  out 
more  and  more,  till  only  three  wires  were  left — A,  C, 
and  D-flat.  This  sacrifice  enabled  him  to  reach  the 
steamboat,  and  he  was  drawn  aboard  half  drowned,  and 
with  one  leg  broken  in  the  operation.  It  was  set,  but  so 
clumsily  put  on  that  he  was  bowlegged  all  the  rest  of 
his  life. 

And  so,  after  many  other  misfortunes,  this  Very  Grand 
Piano  at  last  made  his  way,  with  the  help  of  a  road 
engine,  to  the  field  where  the  windmill  was  waiting  for 
him.  She,  too,  had  not  been  happy,  and  the  memory  of 
the  beautiful,  bright  rosewood  piano,  whom  she  had 
scorned,  kept  her  awake  night  after  night.  How  terri- 
ble, then,  it  was  to  see  him  again — old,  blistered,  dull, 
and  scratched,  with  one  leg  awry,  his  keys  rough  and 
soiled,  and  his  carved  music-rest  full  of  sand  ! 


THE    VERY    GRAND    PIANO. 


67 


But  when  he  began  to  speak  to  her  once  more — though, 
indeed,  he  played  only  on  two  black  keys  and  one  blue 
one — her  heart  melted,  and  she  completely  broke  down, 
weeping  so  that  they  thought  her  water-pipe  had  burst. 

And  so  she  found  that  she  loved  the  piano,  in  spite  of 


his  miserable  appearance,  and  they  were  married  and 
lived  happily  forever  afterwards,  having  two  children,  an 
n  harp  and  a  hand  organ. 


68       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O*    LIGG. 

But  the  old  foghorn  never  stopped  wondering  why  the 
windmill  would  refuse  a  handsome  polished  Very  Grand 
Piano,  with  plenty  of  strings,  and  accept  him  after  he  was 
old  and  used  up,  and  with  only  three  strings  to  his  name  ! 


THE    PERT    FIRE    ENGINE. 


GELETT  BURGESS 


THERE  were  many  fire  engines,  members  of  the  Fire 
Department  of  the  City  o'  Ligg  ;  but  of  all  the  n-.mber, 
the  most  ill-behaved  was  the  disreputable  little  Number 
Four.  He  was  known  all  over  the  city  as  the  black 
sheep  of  the  flock,  and  every  one  knew  the  stones  of  his 
mischief. 

In  spite  of  his  evil  deeds,  however,  he  was  a  very 
handsome  machine,  wearing  a  pretty  coat  of  red  enamel, 
and  all  his  fittings  were  nickelled,  so  that  they  shone  like 
silver  buttons.  He  always  had  silken  hose,  too,  for  he 
was  very  rich.  But  he  was  usually  the  last  engine  at  the 
fire,  and  he  was  always  sure  to  shirk.  He  would  hold 
back  when  he  was  signalled  to  "  Play  away,  Four  /"  and 
he  would  squirt  a  stream  strong  enough  to  drench  the 
Chief,  when  he  should  have  held  back.  He  consumed  an 


74       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

enormous  amount  of  the  most  expensive  fuel,  and  he 
wheezed  and  puffed  till  the  air  shook  with  vibrations.  He 
could  have  been  the  best  engine  in  the  Department,  if  he 
had  wanted  to,  but  he  didn't. 

So  the  people  of  the  City  o'  Ligg  were  not  very  much 
surprised  when  they  learned  that  Number  Four  had  run 
away.  They  hoped  only  that  he  would  stay  away,  for 
they  could  get  along  much  better  without  him.  "  He's 
more  trouble  than  he's  worth,"  said  an  old  ladder-carU 
"  I've  been  tempted,  more  than  once,  to  fall  on  him  and 
break  his  boiler  for  him.  He  won't  even  have  his  hose 
darned,  because  he  prefers  to  leak  all  over  the  street  !  " 

For  a  few  weeks  Number  Four  enjoyed  his  truancy. 
He  spent  most  of  his  time  down  by  a  lake,  a  little  out- 
side the  city,  and  there  he  amused  himself  by  going  in 
swimming,  and  squirting  water  over  himself  like  an  ele- 
phant, till  he  shone  brilliantly  in  the  sunshine.  When  he 
was  tired  of  that,  he  went  around  to  the  farmhouses,  and 
sucked  all  the  water  out  of  their  wells,  and  flooded  their 
cellars.  The  stables  were  all  very  much  afraid  of  him, 
but  dared  not  complain,  though  they  told  their  fences  to 
catch  him  if  they  could. 

Another  favourite  game  of  his  was  to  fill  his  tank  with 
water,  and  squirt  it  at  the  windmills,  playing  on  their 
sails  so  as  to  make  the  wheels  spin  backwards.  This 


THE    PERT    FIRE    ENGINE.         75 

made  many  of  the  windmills  so  ill  that  they  had  to  stop 
pumping  for  weeks. 

But  at  last  Number  Four  grew  tired  of  this  mischief  in 
the  country,  and  he  began  to  cast  about  for  something 
more  exciting  to  do.  So  one  night  he  loaded  himself 
with  water  and  rolled  into  the  City  o'  Ligg. 

He  drew  up  before  a  little  two-story  house  that  was 
not  painted,  but  only  whitewashed,  and  began  to  squirt 
water  all  over  her.  The  poor  little  house  shut  her  doors 
and  windows,  but  even  then  she  was  drenched  to  the 
skin,  and  after  an  hour  or  so,  almost  all  her  whitewash 
was  soaked  off,  and  she  stood,  cold,  dripping,  and  shiver- 
ing in  the  night  air,  with  her  naked  boards  streaked  with 
white.  The  naughty  fire  engine  laughed  brutally  at  her 
distress,  and  went  back  to  the  lake  to  concoct  more  mis- 
chief. 

Every  night,  after  that,  Number  Four  went  into  the 
town  and  drenched  the  houses,  laughing,  as  he  poured 
streams  of  cold  water  down  their  chimneys,  breaking 
their  windows,  washing  away  their  foundations,  and 
splashing  them  all  over  with  muddy  water. 

At  last  it  got  to  be  altogether  too  much  to  endure,  and 
the  houses  consulted  together  to  see  how  Number  Four 
could  be  caught  and  punished.  They  could  think  of  no 
way,  however,  and  so,  after  the  fire  engine  had  showered 


;6       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'LIGG. 

a  very  old  and  respectable  church,  and  had  given  him  a 
severe  cold,  they  applied  to  the  telegraph  office  to  help 
them. 

The  telegraph  office  was  by  far  the  cleverest  building 
in  the  City  o'  Ligg,  but  it  took  him  some  time  to  think 
of  a  remedy  for  this  trouble.  He  consulted,  by  wire,  with 
all  the  offices  around  Ligg,  and  at  last  they  decided  upon 
a  plan. 

Notice  was  sent  out  to  all  the  telegraph  poles  to  strip 
off  their  wires  and  come  into  Ligg  for  further  orders. 
The  next  day  the  houses  were  surprised  to  see  a  proces- 
sion of  long,  naked  telegraph  poles  march  into  town, 
each  with  a  roll  of  wire  on  its  arm.  They  marched  up  to 
the  telegraph  office  that  night  and  received  their  instruc- 
tions. 

As  soon  as  it  was  dark,  the  poles  separated  this  way 
and  that,  going,  some  to  one  part  of  the  town,  and  some 
to  another,  till  the  whole  city  was  surrounded.  For 
several  hours,  while  the  houses  slept  in  peace,  the  poles 
worked,  going  in  and  out  with  the  wires  till  they  had 
woven  a  fence  all  round  the  town.  At  the  principal  en- 
trances, they  left  the  streets  free  for  the  fire  engine  to  get 
in  ;  but  they  contrived  big  V-shaped  traps  here  and  there,, 
which  could  be  closed  by  the  poles  at  a  moment's  notice. 
It  was  by  this  time  twelve  o'clock,  the  hour  when  Number 


THE    PERT    FIRE    ENGINE.          77 

Four  usually  appeared,  and  when  all  the  town  was  quiet 
the  poles  waited  for  the  bad  engine  to  come. 

At  last  they  heard  the  rumble  of  wheels  on  the  road 
from  the  lake,  and  in  the  dark  they  saw  a  bright  light 
approaching  ;  it  was  the  fire  in  the  naughty  engine,  who 
was  puffing  his  way  into  the  town,  chuckling  to  himself 
over  the  fun  he  was  to  have  with  the  Town  Hall  that 
night  ;  for  he  had  planned  to  fill  the  whole  of  the  third 
story  with  water  before  he  came  back. 

Number  Four  came  up  to  the  city  gate,  with  no  sus- 
picion of  what  was  awaiting  him,  and  boldly  rolled  up  the 
main  avenue,  past  the  double  line  of  sleeping  houses. 
There  was  one  house  that  was  snoring  with  a  rough  noise, 
and  the  fire  engine  turned  with  a  laugh  and  sent  a  stream 
of  water  through  its  window. 

Suddenly  the  telegraph  poles  closed  round  him  ;  they 
waved  and  towered  over  his  head,  they  lay  on  the  ground 
across  his  road,  they  threatened  to  fall  upon  him.  The 
poor  engine  was  terrified  out  of  his  senses.  He  backed 
and  jumped,  he  whistled  and  groaned,  and  he  spouted  a 
black  column  of  smoke  out  of  his  funnel,  and  sent  streams 
of  water  in  every  direction.  Suddenly,  seeing  an  open- 
ing, he  darted  back  toward  the  gate,  but  he  soon  found 
himself  walled  in  by  the  wire  fences.  He  tried  another 
way  and  another,  but  there  was  no  escape  ;  the  wires 


78       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

hemmed  him  in  on  all  sides,  till  finally  he  was  stuck  so  fast 
that  he  could  not  move,  and  he  stood  panting,  waiting  to 
see  what  would  happen  next. 

His  wheels  were  tied,  and  his  fires  put  out,  and  the 
next  morning  the  poor  shame-faced  engine  was  pulled 
into  town  past  the  lines  of  houses,  who  jeered  at  him 


scornfully.  He  was  led  into  the  Park  in  the  centre  of  .the 
City  o'  Ligg,  and  there,  where  all  the  principal  buildings 
could  see,  he  was  severely  scolded  by  the  Mayor. 

It  was  a  long  lecture,  telling  the  whole  story  of  his 
wickedness,  and  ending  with  the  sentence  that  was  to  be 
inflicted  upon  him  as  a  punishment.  One  by  one  they 


THE    PERT    FIRE    ENGINE.         79 

took  off  his  bright  red  and  gold  wheels,  they  took  off  his 
pole,  and  whiffle-trees,  his  seat-cushions,  and  tool-box, 
and  then  they  dug  a  deep  hole  in  the  middle  of  the  Park, 
by  the  side  of  a  well,  put  him  in,  covered  him  with  dirt, 
and  sodded  over  the  burial  place. 

And  so,  now,  when  the  tourist  in  the  City  o'  Ligg 
compliments  the  Mayor  upon  the  beautiful  fountain  that 
plays  night  and  day  in  the  middle  of  the  Park,  sending 
up  a  straight  stream  of  water  a  hundred  feet  in  the  air, 
the  Mayor  says  : 

"  Oh,  yes  ;  quite  so,  quite  so  !  That  is  the  naughty 
fire  engine,  little  Number  Four,  working  out  his  time 
of  punishment.  He  was  put  in  for  twenty  years,  but  if 
he  behaves  well,  we're  going  to  let  him  out  in  nineteen  ! " 


THE    INSANE    BATTERY 


THE  City  o'  Ligg  scarcely  needed  any  defenses,  for 
the  town  was  certainly  quite  able  to  take  care  of  himself, 
with  so  many  spirited  inhabitants,  but  for  all  that  there 
was  a  fort,  with  extensive  earthworks,  on  the  river  side. 
In  the  fort  lived  two  dozen  cannon,  and  very  ferocious 
guns  they  were.  There  were  a  dozen  more  field-pieces 
mounting  guard  in  the  earthworks,  and  it  was  this  battery 
that  once  made  a  good  deal  of  trouble. 

Perhaps  the  guns  were  not  altogether  at  fault,  after  all, 
but  they  certainly  went  crazy  and  did  much  damage.  It 
was  partly  the  Mayor's  fault,  for,  being  of  an  economical 
turn  of  mind,  he  decided  to  feed  them  with  cobble  stones, 
to  save  the  expense  of  iron  cannon  balls. 

It  was  not  long  before  one  of  the  largest  guns  fell  ill, 
and  he  insisted  that  cobble  stones  disagreed  with  him. 
Very  little  attention  was  paid  to  him,  for  he  was  well 


84       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O;    LIGG. 

known  to  be  a  grumbler ;  but  when,  one  after  the  other, 
all  the  rest  of  the  cannon  refused  to  eat  more  cobble 
stones,  and  lay  about  the  fortifications,  wheezing  and 
sneezing  and  coughing,  it  was  plainly  to  be  seen  that 
something  must  be  done  about  it. 

The  whole  battery  was  sent  to  be  treated  at  the  fort, 
where  it  lay  about,  groaning  and  barking,  in  great  agony. 
Red-hot  cannon  balls  and  shells  did  no  good  whatever. 

The  guns  swallowed  tons  and  tons  of  powder,  which 
were  rammed  down  their  throats  with  ramrods,  but  it 
seemed  to  be  of  no  use,  and  the  little  caissons  who  waited 
on  them  and  nursed  them  grew  very  much  alarmed.  One 
or  two  of  the  ca-nnon  blew  up  one  night,  with  a  loud, 
terrifying  report,  while  in  a  violent  fit  of  coughing. 

At  last,  unable  to  stand  the  agony  any  longer,  one  of 
the  field-pieces  got  up  and  wheeled  down  to  the  magazine, 
to  see  if  he  couldn't  find  something  that  would  ease  his 
pain,  and  there  he  discovered,  in  one  corner,  a  large  pile 
of  dynamite  sticks.  He  tried  one,  and  it  tasted  sweet 
and  fresh.  "At  any  rate,"  he  said  to  himself,  "whether 
these  are  good  for  me  or  not,  they  can't  be  worse  than  cob- 
ble stones,  and  they  taste  much  better,  so  I  might  as  well 
die  happily.  I'm  going  to  eat  all  I  can  ! " 

So  he  ate  a  dozen  or  more  sticks  of  dynamite,  and  then 
went  up  to  the  hospital  and  told  the  Qther  guns  about  it. 


THE    INSANE    BATTERY.  85 

They  all  became  much  excited  at  the  news,  and  resolved 
to  do  the  same.  "  Who  knows,  it  may  do  us  good  ! " 
they  cried. 

So  they  all  went  down  into  the  magazine,  and  began 
to  eat  dynamite.  By  and  by  they  began  to  feel  very 
queer.  The  youngest  and  smallest  guns  began  to  prance 
around  the  room  in  their  carriages,  and  yell  in  loud,  coarse 
voices.  The  older  ones  were  not  affected  so  soon,  but 
after  a  while,  they,  too,  began  to  feel  very  gay  and  silly, 
so  that  before  long  there  was  such  a  riot  in  the  magazine 
that  the  mortars  thought  the  place  had  exploded,  and 
waddled  away  for  their  lives. 

"  Let's  go  into  the  town  !"  cried  one  of  the  cannon, 
and  the  words  were  no  sooner  out  of  his  mouth,  than  the 
whole  battery  of  them  echoed,  "  Let's  go  into  the  town  ! " 
So  they  formed  a  disorderly  procession,  and  rolling  and 
wheeling  in  confusion,  shouting  and  screaming,  bumping 
and  falling,  they  raced  into  town.  By  this  time,  it  is 
needless  to  say,  they  were  stark,  staring  mad  ! 

At  the  City  gate  they  fired  a  heavy  salute,  and  then 
broke  in  with  a  yell.  An  old  omnibus  rolled  up  to  them 
to  see  what  was  the  matter,  but  when  he  saw  the  battery 
he  took  to  his  wheels  and  scuttled  off.  The  guns  began 
firing-  shots  at  him  at  short  range,  and  drove  him  back,  in 
great  alarm,  to  tell  the  awful  news. 


86       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

The  cannon  now  began  firing  at  everything  in  sight. 
They  shot  the  weathercocks  off  the  church  steeples  ;  they 
shot  patterns  of  ball-holes  in  the  front  of  the  town  hall  ; 
they  broke  windows  with  grape,  and  they  ploughed  up 
the  streets  with  canister.  They  tossed  shells  into  the 
shops,  and  they  blew  the  roofs  off  dwelling  houses.  They 
set  fire  to  barns  and  stables,  and  they  pounded  the  piers 
of  the  bridges  to  pieces.  They  blew  up  the  sidewalks 
with  shrapnel,  and  cut  down  all  the  trees  in  the  Park  close 
to  their  roots.  Meanwhile,  they  were  smoking  and  swear- 
ing horribly,  while  they  loaded  themselves  with  fury. 

It  was  a  terrible  time  for  the  inhabitants  of  the  City  o' 
Ligg  !  The  town  had  not  been  so  lively  since  the  fire 
engine  ran  away.  By  morning,  when  the  exhausted 
artillery  had  fallen  asleep  in  the  Park,  there  was  not  a 
human  being  in  the  City,  for  all  had  run  away  to  the 
woods.  Here  the  Mayor  held  a  great  mass  meeting  to 
see  what  could  be  clone  to  prevent  a  continuation  of  the 
night's  outrage.  But  no  one  had  anything  effective  to 
propose,  for  no  one  dared  to  enter  the  town  to  do  any- 
thing. If  it  kept  up  much  longer,  the  houses  would 
surely  run  away,  'and  then  where  would  be  the  City  o' 


But  there  was  a  little  boy  thefe,  named  Yak,  who  was 
very  valourous.     He  was  the   same  who  once  tamed  a 


THE    INSANE    BATTERY.  87 

frightfully  furious  railway  train,  and  though  he  was  very 
little,  he  was  a  great  friend  of  the  Mayor. 

u  I  think  I  can  do  it,"  he  said,  "  and  all  I  want  is  a 
hammer." 

So  the  Mayor  gave  him  a  hammer  and  his  blessing, 
and  Yak  went  all  alone  into  the  City  o'  Ligg. 

It  was  nine  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  the  fieldpieces 
were  still  sound  asleep,  in  the  middle  of  the  Park,  by  the 
fountain.  They  were  snoring  in  a  terrible  manner,  and 
all  around  the  houses  were  trembling  as  if  there  were  an 
earthquake  on  foot,  for  they  were  dreading  the  waking  of 
the  artillery.  Some  of  the  houses  had  already  begun  to 
move.  The  streets  looked  as  if  they  had  been  deserted 
for  one  hundred  and  fifty-two  years. 

Yak,  tightly  clasping  his  hammer  in  his  hand,  stealthily 
approached  the  mad  battery,  which  was  sprawling  in 
great  confusion  on  the  grass.  Almost  all  the  guns  had 
gone  to  sleep  in  their  carriages,  but  there  were  a  few 
who  had  dismounted,  and  lay  upon  the  ground.  The 
little  boy  made  his  way  carefully  amongst  them,  and 
stepped  up  to  the  largest  gun.  With  a  single  stroke  he 
knocked  off  its  sights,  rendering  the  piece  totally  blind. 
Before  he  had  quite  awakened  Yak  was  out  of  harm's 
way,  and  had  attacked  another  cannon.  The  first  was 
now  thoroughly  aroused,  and,  wild  with  pain  and  rage, 
began  to  fire  away  blindly,  right  and  left. 


88       THE    LIVELY    CITYO'    LIGG. 

It  was  a  dangerous  ordeal,  but  Yak's  courage  did  not 
once  desert  him.  He  ran  from  one  gun  to.  another 
while  they  were  still  drowsy  with  dynamite,  and  finally 
succeeded  in  knocking  the  sights  off  them  all,  except  the 
three  upon  the  ground.  He  dragged  their  carriages 
away  from  them,  so  that  they  could  not  turn  round,  but 
would  have  to  fire  only  in  one  direction.  As  by  this  time 


they  were  the  only  ones  who  could  see,  they  were  in  a 
ferocious  rage,  and  implored  their  comrades  to  shoot  the 
boy.  But  as  the  others  could  not  aim,  they  sent  cannon 
balls  in  every  direction  but  the  right  one. 

The  fury  of  the  battery  was  now  awful.  It  fired  right 
and  left  and  into  the  air,  hoping  that  some  of  the  balls 
might  fall  on  Yak.  It  made  a  most  frightful  banging,  and 
the  City  was  soon  filled  with  clouds  of  smoke. 


THE    INSANE    BATTERY.  89 

Yak's  work,  however,  was  not  yet  done.  Alone  and 
single-handed,  at  the  risk  of  his  life,  he  dragged  the 
carriages  this  way  and  that  and  tied  them  down.  His 
plan  was  to  range  them  in  two  opposite  rows  so  that 
they  would  shoot  each  other  to  little  pieces.  In  this  he 
was  at  last  successful.  One  after  another  the  guns 
were  dismounted.  As  soon  as  one  was  left  alone  in  the 
duel  Yak  spiked  it,  driving  a  nail  into  the  touch-hole,  till 
by  noontime  every  gun  was  silenced  or  destroyed. 

When  the  inhabitants  at  last  dared  to  venture  into  the 
City  o'  Ligg,  they  found  little  ifak  sitting  on  a  gun 
carriage  smiling,  but  so  dirty  that  the  Mayor  hardly  knew 
him.  His  face  was  black  with  gunpowder  and  smoke, 
and  the  only  white  things  about  him  were  his  teeth  and 
his  eyeballs. 

The  Mayor  of  the  City  o'  Ligg  never  tried  to  be 
economical  after  that. 


THE    HILARIOUS    HANSOM 


'ELETT    BURGESS 


THERE  was  once,  in  the  City  o'  Ligg,  a  splendid,  vain- 
glorious hansom  cab,  with  a  blue  body  and  yellow  wheels. 
It  was  fitted  up  in  the  very  best  taste,  having  once  been 
a  private  hansom,  when  it  used  to  be  driven  by  a  coach- 
man in  livery.  Now  that  it  was  only  a  hackney  carriage, 
licensed  to  carry  two  persons,  and  with  an  ugly,  white 
tariff  list  of  charges  fastened  to  its  dashboard,  it  was  in  a 
perpetual  state  of  dissatisfaction. 

"To  think  that  I  should  have  to  carry  Tom,  Dick,  and 
Harry  ! "  it  said  to  itself.  "  I,  who  have  been  a  private 
carriage  !  I'll  show  them  that  I  still  have  spirit !"  And 
it  fairly  jounced  with  indignation. 

It  used  to  misbehave  itself  so,  that  at  last  its  driver 
hardly  dared  to  drive  it.  The  hansom  would  back  and 
wheel,  and  toss  him  off  his  box,  and  behave  in  many' 


96       THE    LIVELY    CITY    O '    LIGG. 

other  disagreeable  ways,  so  that  the  poor  cabby  had  hard 
work  in  getting  a  fare.  Everyone  shunned  the  blue  han- 
som with  yellow  wheels,  for  the  story  of  its  pranks  had 
spread  over  the  Cityo'  Ligg,  and  people  said  that  such  an 
ill-tempered  cab  was  not  safe. 

The  driver's  trade  fell  off  so  that  he  decided  to  dis- 
guise the  cab  ;  so  he  sent  it  to  a  coach  painter,  and  had  it 
all  painted  as  black  as  a  beetle.  When  it  came  out  again, 
all  shiny  with  varnish,  the  hansom  was  so  furious  that, 
when  they  harnessed  the  horse  in  between  the  shafts,  its 
lanterns  flashed  with  rage. 

All  of  a  sudden,  just  as  the  driver  was  mounting  the 
little  seat  behind,  the  hansom  exerted  all  its  strength, 
bent  its  shafts  almost  to  the  ground,  and  then  with  a  terri- 
ble jerk  threw  them  upward,  breaking  the  traces,  and 
tossed  the  horse  a  hundred  feet  high  into  the  air  ! 

The  enraged  driver  took  his  whip  and  beat  the  cab 
unmercifully,  but,  of  course,  that  did  no  good.  The  cab 
chased  him  all  round  the  stable  yard  and  came  near  pin- 
ning him  against  the  fence.  It  clapped  its  little  doors 
together  and  spun  around  in  circles  till  the  cabby  yelled 
for  help. 

An  old  green  omnibus  rolled  up  to  the  stable  and 
wanted  to  know  what  was  the  matter.  After  the  driver 
had  told  him,  the  omnibus  said  :  "  Oh,  I  know  how  to  fix 


THE    HILARIOUS    HANSOM.        97 

him!  I've  seen  horrid  hansoms  before,  and,  as  for  that, 
they're  all  a  pretty  bad  lot,  these  two-wheelers  ;  one  can 
never  depend  on  them.  You  see,  they  have  no  brakes, 
and  they're  always  letting  their  tempers  run  away  with 
them.  But  the  thing  for  you  to  do  is  to  harness  your 
horse  in  backwards,  then  the  cab  can't  do  anything  at 
all  !  "  But  the  omnibus  did  not  notice  that  this  hansom 
was  one  of  the  very  few  that  have  windows  in  the  back  ; 
that  makes  a  good  deal  of  difference  in  a  hansom  cab,  for 
then  it  can  see  behind  it. 

The  driver  thanked  the  omnibus  very  politely  for  his 
advice,  and  got  twenty  men  to  hold  his  cab  while  he 
harnessed  another  horse  into  the  shafts,  putting  the  head 
of  the  animal  where  its  tail  ought  to  be — facing  the  dash- 
board. The  cab  seemed  by  this  time  to  be  as  gentle  a 
vehicle  as  ever  rolled  on  wheels.  It  was  as  quiet  as  a 
wheelbarrow,  but  it  was  a  sly,  'cute  hansom,  and  it  was 
waiting  for  a  good  chance  to  get  away. 

It  was  a  remarkable  sight,  when  the  cabby  drove  out 
of  the  stable  yard,  and  the  twenty  men  yelled  with  joy  to 
see  the  hansom  going  backwards,  pushed  by  a  bewildered 
horse,  and  the  driver  in  the  little  box,  up  in  the  front  of 
the  carriage,  with  the  reins  stretching  out  behind  him. 
But  he  got  along  better  than  he  had  expected,  hard  as  it 
was  to  steer  around  corners  in  this  queer  way. 


98      THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

Very  few  persons  dared  to  try  to  ride  in  such  an  equi- 
page, however,  and  by  noontime  the  driver  became  very 
much  discouraged,  and  started  for  home.  Now  it  was 
very  foolish  of  him  to  attempt  to  drive  down  hill  with  the 
cab  before  the  horse,  in  this  way,  but  he  did  not  stop  to 
think  of  the  danger,  and,  before  he  knew  it,  he  was  on  a 
heavy  down  grade. 

This  was  just  what  the  cab  had  been  waiting  for.  It 
opened  the  window  in  its  back,  which  was  now  its  front, 
and,  drawing  a  long  breath,  it  dashed  forward  with  tre- 
mendous speed,  dragging  the  horse  behind  it  so  fast  that 
the  poor  creature  could  hardly  keep  his  feet  on  the 
ground,  and  was  swept  through  the  air  in  great,  undigni- 
fied jumps. 

In  vain  the  driver  shouted  for  help.  He  tried  to  get 
down  from  the  box,  but  he  dared  not  risk  a  fall,  so  he 
clung  to  his  seat  with  both  hands,  in  terror,  jolted  to  one 
side  and  the  other  as  the  hilarious  hansom  flew  down  the 
hill  faster  and  faster.  The  cab  was  running  away  with 
him,  and  he  dared  not  think  what  was  going  to  happen 
next. 

The  road  at  the  bottom  of  the  hill  crossed  a  wide  river 
by  a  stone  bridge.  Just  before  the  runaway  reached 
this  the  cab  sheered  suddenly  to  the  left,  nearly  throw- 
ing off  the  shrieking,  terrified  driver,  and,  with  a  tremen- 


THE    HILARIOUS    HANSOM.        99 

dous  bound,  jumped  the  wall  at  the  side  of  the  road,  and 
plunged  into  the  river. 

The  driver  thought  that  the  hansom  could  go  no  fur- 
ther, and  he  was  preparing  to  dive  into  the  water  and 
swim  for  the  shore,  when  the  cab  wheels  began  to  revolve 
like  paddle  wheels  with  great  velocity,  and,  churning  the 
water  into  a  froth  of  foam  and  bubbles,  they  sailed  up 
the  stream  at  the  rate  of  fifteen  miles  an  hour,  like  a  new 
sort  of  steamboat. 

Once  sure  they  could  navigate  the  stream  with  safety, 
the  driver  gave  up  all  thought  of  escaping,  and  decided 
to  see  the  adventure  out.  He  turned  his  attention  to  the 
horse,  who  also  seemed  to  be  beginning  to  enjoy  the 
trip.  He  had  become  very  hot  with  such  terrific  exercise, 
and  the  bath  was  very  refreshing,  especially  as  he  did  not 
have  to  swim,  but  allowed  himself  to  be  towed  along  by 
the  paddle  cab,  his  tail  streaming  out  behind. 

Hours  passed,  and  still  they  sailed  up  the  river.  At 
last,  however,  they  could  go  no  further,  for  a  dam  blocked 
'the  way.  The  cab  floated  around  below  the  mill  pond 
for  a  while,  as  if  lost  in  thought,  and  then,  heading  for 
the  bank,  climbed  upon  the  ground  again,  shook  itself  like 
a  clog,  and  proceeded  towards  the  mill. 

It  was  a  small  mill,  and  a  rather  pretty  one,  with  a 
flashing  red  wheel  spattering  the  waters  of  the  mill  race 


ioo    THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

in  every  direction.  This  wheel  seemed  to  fascinate  the 
hansom  cab.  It  gazed  and  gazed,  and  after  a  while  the 
driver  heard  it  say  to  itself : 

"Ah,  I,  too,  was  once  beautiful,  when  I  had  a  blue 
body  and  yellow  wheels  !  Now,  I  am  all  of  a  gruesome 
black,  as  ugly  as  a  hearse  !  How  I  wish  I  could  have 
those  wheels  ;  red  ones  are  not  nearly  so  pretty  as  yellow, 
but  they  are  much  better  than  black  !" 

So  saying,  the  cab  approached  the  mill,  which  was  so 
busy  grinding  corn  that  it  had  not  noticed  the  strangers. 
"  Hello  ! "  cried  the  hansom  cab. 

The  mill  did  not  stop  for  a  little  while,  but  it  said, 
"  Hello  yourself !  " 

"  What  will  you  take  for  your  wheels?"  enquired  the 
cab. 

The  mill  stopped  now,  opened  its  windows,  and  looked 
at  the  hansom.  "  What'll  you  give  ?"  it  said. 

"  I  tell  you  what  I'll  do,"  said  the  cab.  "  I'll  exchange 
with  you  even  ;  my  wheels  have  rubber  tyres,  and  they're 
remarkably  easy  on  the  axles  ! " 

The  mill  was  silent  awhile,  and  looked  the  cab  all  over, 
from  shafts  to  roof.  Then  it  winked  one  shutter,  and 
said,  "  All  right,  I'll  go  you.  You  sit  down  beside  me, 
here,  by  the  mill  race,  where  I  can  hand  them  to  you." 

So  the  mill  moved  along  a  little,  and  made  room  for 


THE    HILARIOUS    HANSOM.      101 

the  hansom,  which  sat  clown  and  took  off  its  wheels. 
Then  the  mill  took  off  its  own  wheels,  and  put  the  han- 
som's on  slowly,  so  that  the  cab  should  be  ready  first. 


The  cab  looked  very  pleased  as  it  tried  on  the  red  mill 
wheels,  and  spun  them  around  merrily  ;  but  they  would 
only  go  round  one  way. 

"  See  here,"  it  cried,  "  these  are  no  good;  give  me  mine 
back,  will  you  !  " 


102     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

But  it  was  too  late.  As  soon  as  the  mill  saw  its  wheels 
on  the  cab,  it  slipped  on  the  rubber-tyred  wheels,  and  was 
up  and  off  in  an  instant.  The  last  thing  the  hansom  saw 
of  the  mill  it  was  disappearing  in  the  forest  a  half  mile 
away. 

And,  to  its  dismay,  the  hansom  found  that  the  paddle 
wheels  not  only  would  not  go  backwards,  but  they 
wouldn't  stop  to  allow  it  to  take  them  off,  but  kept  spin- 
ning and  spinning  round,  till  the  miller  came  along,  and 
filled  the  poor  captive  cab  full  of  corn,  and  set  it  grinding 
the  mill's  grist.  And  there  the  hansom  cab  had  to  stay 
for  the  rest  of  its  life,  grinding  corn  year  in  and  year  out. 

The  miller  helped  the  cabby  to  unhitch  the  horse  from 
the  shafts,  and  was  told  the  whole  story  of  the  vainglori- 
ous hansom. 

"  Well,"  said  the  miller,  as  the  driver  got  astride  his 
horse,  ready  to  ride  home  to  the  City  o'  Ligg,  "  I  expect 
it  will  serve  the  hansom  right  for  having  been  so  proud 
and  vain  ! " 


THE    STEAMBOAT    AND    THE 
LOCOMOTIVE. 


Jtf 


ON  the  railway  that  ran  through  the  City  o'  Ligg  there 
was  once  an  English-made  locomotive  who  was  always 
discontented  and  grumbling.  Nothing  in  the  world  was 
good  enough  for  him  ;  or,  at  least,  nothing  in  the 
City  o'  Ligg. 

His  coal  was  too  hard  or  too  soft;  it  was  never  just 
right.  He  hated  to  pull  passenger  trains  because  he  had 
to  go  so  fast,  and  he  didn't  like  to  pull  freight  trains  be- 
cause they  were  too  heavy.  He  was  always  complaining 
that  he  was  out  of  order,  so  that  he  might  stay  in  the 
Round  House,  and  not  work.  He  would  shut  himself 
on  sidings  in  hopes  he  might  be  forgotten  ;  he  was  afraid 
to  go  over  bridges,  for  fear  they  would  break  clown  ;  and 
he  hated  tunnels  because  they  were  so  dark  and  cold. 
He  thought  iron  rails  were  too  soft  to  net  eood  hold  on, 


io6     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

and  he  said  that  steel  rails  were  altogether  too  slippery. 
Sometimes  he  declared  that  he  wouldn't  run  where  there 
were  not  modern  metal  ties,  and  at  other  times  he 
asserted  that  the  old-fashioned  wooden  sleepers  made  a 
much  better  road-bed.  He  quarrelled  with  his  tender, 
and  he  refused  to  be  coupled  up  to  one  that  he  didn't 
fancy.  He  snorted  and  hissed  at  the  semaphores  and 
point  signals,  and  he  was  a  nuisance  to  the  railway  in 
more  ways  than  can  be  told. 

But  if  he  were  bad,  there  was  a  young  steamboat  on  the 
river  who  was  worse.  She  was  a  very  pretty  craft,  but 
that  was  no  reason  why  she  should  insist  on  having  a 
new  set  of  paddle-wheels  every  year.  She  was  absurdly 
particular  about  her  funnel,  and  if  it  were  not  painted  the 
exact  colour  that  she  fancied,  she  would  declare  that  she 
would  scuttle  herself.  She  would  roll  and  pitch  with 
anger  if  they  tried  to  back  her.  She  would  dig  up  the 
muddy  bottom  of  the  river  with  her  paddles,  and  she  gave 
a  deal  of  trouble  about  steering. 

When  these  two  ill-natured  creatures  came  together  at 
the  dock  in  the  river,  below  the  fortifications,  they  used 
to  complain  to  each  other  till  the  cannon  above  them 
would  cry,  "  Oh,  I  say  \  "  and  the  bridge  told  them  that 
they  ought  to  be  ashamed  of  themselves. 

One  day,  after  the  steamboat  had  been  carrying  a  load 


STEAMBOAT  AND  LOCOMOTIVE.  107 

of  noisy  excursionists  up  from  the  harbour,  she  found  the 
locomotive  on  the  pier  in  a  very  gloomy  state  of  mind. 

''I'm  not  going  to  stand  this  any  longer!"  he  said. 
"  They've  put  me  to  hauling  coal,  and  it's  no  work  for  a 
machine  like  me,  especially  when  I  can't  burn  any  of  it 
myself.  I'm  going  to  run  away  !" 

"  Well,  that's  a  good  idea  ;  suppose  I  go  with  you,  and 
we'll  set  out  together  to  seek  our  fortunes!"  said  the 
steamer. 

They  talked  it  all  over,  and  finally  decided  to  start  that 
very  night.  The  steamboat  was  to  help  the  locomotive 
on  the  water,  and  the  locomotive  was  to  help  the  steamboat 
on  the  land.  They  were  to  share  their  wood  and  coal 
and  water  together,  and  have  a  jolly  good  time  as  long 
as  they  could. 

At  midnight  the  locomotive  got  on  board  the  boat,  and 
she  steamed  softly  up  the  river.  "  This  is  fun  !  "  said  the 
locomotive. 

"  It's  all  right  for  you,"  said  the  boat ;  "  but  I  must  say 
you're  heavier  than  I  thought.  Wait  till  \\tsyour  turn  to 
give  me  a  ride.  I  can't  go  very  much  farther,  anyway, 
the  water  is  getting  shallow.  There's  a  dam  up  above 
here,  so  I  think  we'd  better  go  ashore  now." 

She  climbed  up  the  bank  with  the  locomotive's  assist- 
ance, and  he  then  hoisted  her  up  on  top  of  his  cab,  and 


loS     THE    LIVELY. CITY    O'    LIGG. 

set  out  across  the  fields.  She  was  a  little  boat,  but  she 
was  heavy,  and  the  locomotive  puffed  away  with  all  his 
might  through  the  grass,  stopping  to  rest  once  in  a  while. 
So  they  went  on  for  several  days,  turn  and  turn  about, 
for  they  had  to  cross  several  lakes  on  their  way. 

After  awhile  they  began  to  approach  a  line  of  hills, 
and  the  ground  grew  steeper  and  steeper,  till  at  last  the 
locomotive  could  go  no  farther  with  the  steamboat  on  his 
back.  So  she  o-ot  off  and  scrambled  along"  tor  a  few 

o  o          •» 

miles  with  her  paddle-wheels  while  the  locomotive 
pushed  her  from  behind.  But  the  time  came  when  they 
could  neither  of  them  go  a  step  farther,  and  they  lay  on 
the  ground  exhausted.  To  make  matters  worse,  they 
grew  short  of  water  and  fuel.  They  cut  down  their 
rations  to  a  ton  of  coal  and  a  barrel  of  water  a  clay,  and 
even  then  they  didn't  have  enough  to  take  them  back  to 
either  a  forest  or  a  lake. 

It  seemed  likely  that  they  would  have  to  perish  there 
on  the  hillside,  and  they  quarrelled  with  each  other 
peevishly,  each  accusing  the  other  of  being  at  fault  for 
suggesting  this  terrible  journey.  The  old  river  Wob 
and  the  railway  of  the  City  o'  Ligg  had  never  seemed  so 
pleasant  before,  but,  alas  !  it  was  many  days'  journey 
away. 

Just  as  they  had  begun  to  think    that  all    hope    was 


STEAMBOAT  AND  L  O  C  O  M  O  T  I  V  E  .  109 

gone,  one  of  them  espied  a  dot  in  the  sky.  It  grew 
slowly  larger  and  larger. 

"  It  is  a  balloon!  "  they  cried  together,  and  they  both 
began  to  blow  their  whistles  with  all  the  strength  of  the 
little  steam  that  was  left  in  their  boilers. 

The  balloon  came  nearer  and  nearer,  till  it  had  got 
within  hailing  distance,  and  then  they  saw  it  was  laugh- 
ing almost  hard  enough  to  split  its  sides.  It  was  a  very 
fat,  pink,  round  balloon,  and  as  it  shook  with  merriment, 
its  basket  swung  wildly  above  them. 

"  Well,  I  declare  !  "  it  cried  out,  "  this  is  the  queerest 
thing  I  ever  saw  !  What  in  the  world  are  you  two  doing 
away  up  in  these  mountains  ?  I  never  saw  a  locomotive 
or  a  steamboat  on  top  of  a  hill  before  !  " 

"  For  heaven's  sake,  please  don't  laugh  like  that," 
cried  the  steamer ;  "  but  come  and  help  us,  before  we 
perish  !  " 

The  balloon  finally  consented  to  give  them  assistance 
over  the  mountains,  and  let  clown  a  rope,  which  the  two 
tied  around  their  waists.  The  balloon  then  rose,  and  the 
locomotive  and  steamboat  were  hoisted  high  in  the  air, 
and  they  all  sailed  away  towards  the  East,  across  the 
range  of  mountains.  They  had  floated  for  a  half  a  day 
in  this  way,  when  the  balloon  gave  a  pull  up,  a  little 
harder  than  usual,  and  the  rope  suddenly  broke  ! 


no    THE    LIVELY    CITY   O'    LIGG. 

Down  went  the  two,  falling  faster  and  faster  through 
the  air,  and  they  both  thought  that  their  last  moment 
had  come.  But  by  good  luck  they  happened  to  fall  in 


the  middle  of  a  large  forest,  and  landed  safely  in  a  great 
oak  tree,  without  breaking  a  piece  of  machinery. 

Yet  they  had,  after  all,  escaped  one  danger  only  to  fall 
into  another.  They  were  lost  in  an  immense  wilderness, 
and  did  not  know  in  which  direction  to  turn.  The  loco- 


STEAMBOAT  AND  LOCOMOTIVE,  in 

motive  finally   succeeded    in    climbing   a   tall    tree,   and 
made  out  smoke  rising1  in  the  distance. 

To  this  they  painfully  made  their  way,  and,  after  a  ter- 
rible struggle,  they  drew  near — rusty,  scratched,  and 
smoky — and  came  to  an  old  saw-mill  by  the  side  of  a  little 
stream.  It  was  a  hideous  old  mill,  of  a  villainous  aspect, 
that  alarmed  them  both.  But  here  was  their  only  hope, 
and  though  they  were  far  from  any  assistance  in  case  of 
danger,  the  two  unfortunate  machines  found  themselves 
obliged  to  apply  to  the  mill  for  shelter  and  fuel. 

The  mill  welcomed  them  very  hospitably,  but  there 
was  something  in  his  dusty,  oily  manner  that  the  loco- 
motive did  not  trust,  and  he  resolved  to  stay  awake  and 
watch.  The  little,  delicate  steamboat  was,  by  this  time, 
too  exhausted  to  notice  anything.  After  they  had 
drunk  many  barrels  of  water  each,  they  revived  a  little, 
and  the  mill  offered  them  a  few  tons  of  sawdust,  which, 
he  said,  was  the  only  fuel  he  could  give  them.  At  the 
first  trial  the  steamer  whispered  to  the  locomotive  that  it 
tasted  queerly,  but  they  decided  that  it  was  only  the  oil 
in  which  it  was  soaked.  At  any  rate,  they  had  to  eat 
that  or  nothing,  and  they  made  a  meal  of  it  without 
more  ado. 

Hardly  had  they  burned  the   last   mouthful,  however, 
before  they  both  fell  into  a  heavy  sleep,  and  knew  noth- 


H2     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

ing  for  many  hours.  The  locomotive  was  awakened  by 
a  sudden  horrible  pain,  and  he  was  terrified  to  find  the 
teeth  of  a  buzz-saw  cutting  through  his  side.  He  sprang 
up  with  a  roar  of  agony,  but  it  was  too  late  ;  his  left  hind 
wheel  had  been  bitten  off  !  He  charged  furiously  at  the 
sides  of  the  mill,  and  tore  open  a  great  hole,  then 
dragged  ou.t  the  steamboat,  and  ran  her  into  the  forest 
as  fast  as  his  five  wheels  could  carry  him.  The  mill 
screamed  and  shrieked  after  them  as  they  hurried  away. 

As  they  stood  trembling  in  the  forest,  and  thanked 
their  stars  for  such  a  narrow  escape,  a  sudden  glare  of 
light  attracted  their  attention.  The  mill  was  on  fire,  set, 
no  doubt,  from  some  sparks  dropped  by  the  locomotive 
in  its  terrible  struggle  for  escape. 

By  the  light  of  the  burning  mill  they  made  their  way 
through  the  forest  all  night.  With  new  fuel  and  water 
their  strength  had  been  partially  renewed,  and  terror 
increased  their  efforts. 

In  the  morning,  after  a  short  sleep,  they  awoke  to  find 
themselves  by  the  side  of  a  wide  river,  to  which  they  had 
hobbled  during  the  night,  but  had  not  seen  in  the  dark. 
Alongside  the  bank  of  the  stream  ran  a  beautiful,  level 
railway  line.  They  looked  and  looked,  hardly  able  to 
believe  their  windows.  It  was  too  good  to  be  true  ! 

It  did  not  take  them  long  to  decide  what  to  .do.     The 


STEAMBOAT  AND  LOCOMOTIVE.  113 

little  steamboat  gave  one  leap  into  the  river,  and  whistled 
long  and  merrily.  The  locomotive  crawled  on  to  the 
line,  and  rang  its  bell  in  a  joyous  peal.  For  they  knew 
by  the  looks  of  the  country  that  they  had  bee-n  travelling 
in  a  huge  semi-circle,  and  that  the  river  and  the  railway 
led  directly  into  the  City  o'  Ligg. 

So  they  steamed  along,  side  by  side,  together,  the 
lame  locomotive  and  the  sorrowful,  shamefaced  steam- 
boat. That  day  one  laid  her  head  at  last  alongside  the 
dock,  and  one  puffed  timidly  into  the  station  ;  both 
decided  never  to  complain  of  any  work  that  they  should 
have  to  do  in  the  future. 


THE    BOTHERSOME    BRIG. 


GELETT  BURGESS 


THERE  was  a  bold,  boisterous  little  brig  that  came  np 
the  river  Wob  to  the  City  o'  Ligg  twice  a  year,  with 
a  cargo  of  confectionery  from  foreign  ports.  Every 
June  and  every  November  she  entered  the  harbour, 
waved  her  flag  at  the  light-house  on  the  island,  gave 
her  bow  to  the  tug  who  came  down  to  escort  her  up- 
stream, and,  after  twisting  through  the  curly  channel  for  a 
day,  cast  her  anchor,  and  lay  in  the  river,  just  off  the  rail- 
way pier,  below  the  fortifications. 

But  this  was  all  she  ever  saw  of  the  lively  City  o'  Ligg. 
There  were  but  a  few  houses  visible,  and  the  spire  of  a 
church  beyond,  from  whose  belfry  the  chimes  called  out  a 
welcome  to  her  whenever  she  came  to  port ;  but  the  little 
brig  had,  of  course,  never  seen  the  Town  Hall,  nor  the 
Post  Office,  nor  any  of  the  wonderful  buildings  she  had 
heard  so  much  about. 


120    THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

Now,  the  last  time  the  brig  came  to  Ligg  she  found  a 
steam-roller  going  back  and  forth  on  the  new  road  by  the 
railway  pier,  and  whenever  he  stopped  work  she  used  to 
gossip  with  him  about  the  sights  of  the  city.  He  was  a 
lazy  old  thing,  was  the  steam-roller,  and  so  fat  and  heavy 
that  he  could  scarcely  puff  up  and  down  over  the  gravel 
on  the  new  road.  It  took  too  much  effort  for  him  to  turn 
round  when  he  had  to  return  to  the  pier,  and  so  he  used 
to  stop  and  then  crawl  backwards.  Indeed,  it  would  have 
taken  as  much  room  for  him  to  have  turned  round  in 
as  would  have  been  necessary  for  the  brig  herself. 

"  You're  a  queer  old  catamaran,"  said  the  saucy  brig  to 
him  one  day  ;  "  you  ought  to  go  to  sea,  where  there's 
plenty  of  room  to  turn  around." 

*/  I'd  like  to,  sure,  "  said  the  steam  roller.  "  They  say 
the  roads  are  pretty  rough  and  lumpy  in  the  ocean.  I 
should  think  that  they  would  need  a  deal  of  rolling  ! " 

"  Oh,  we  can  all  roll  ourselves,"  said  the  bright  brig, 

"  Really,  I'd  like  to  go,"  continued  the  roller.  "  I'm 
tired  of  this  everlasting  up  and  down,  and  back  and  forth, 
to  and  fro,  forward  and  back,  and  all.  Always  in  the 
mud,  too  !  I'm  positively  filthy  with  this  slime.  I'd  like 
to  go  in  swimming  and  get  clean  !  I  believe  I  will  !  Do 
you  think  I  could  swim  ?  I  never  tried." 

"  Of  course  you  could  !"  said  the  bad  brig.     "It's  as 


THE    BOTHERSOME    BRIG.        121 

easy  as  rolling  !     Go  on  in  !  "  and  she  smiled  behind  her 
foresail. 

The  stupid  steam-roller,  at  this  mischievous  encourage- 
ment, started  for  the  bank  and  rushed  down  with  a  rattle 
and  slam,  and  after  a  short  run  brought  up  short,  stuck1 
fast  in  the  thick  mud  at  the  edge  of  the  water.  Here  he 
puffed  and  snorted,  and  great  beads  of  water  dripped 
from  his  round  boiler  in  the  effort  to  move,  but  it  was  of 
no  use,  he  was  mired.  "Oh,  help  !  help !  I'm  stuck  !  "  he 
cried. 

The  brig  moved  over  a  little  nearer  and  looked  at  him  and 
laughed.  "  Well,  well !  "  she  said.  "You  do  look  like  a  pig 
in  a  pen  !  How  are  you  ever  going  to  get  out,  Roly  ?" 
Then,  after  watching  his  struggles  for  awhile,  an  idea 
occurred  to  her.  "  I'll  tell  you  what  I'll  do.  If  you'll  take 
me  into  town,  and  show  me  the  sights,  I'll  hoist  you  out 
of  the  mud  and  put  you  on  the  road  again." 

"  All  right,"  said  the  roller,  glad  of  any  chance  to 
escape.  So  the  brig  set  her  topsails,  and  crept  up  to  the 
edge  of  tHe  stream,  and  then  dipped  her  bowsprit  under 
the  wheel  of  the  steam-roller,  and  pushed,  and  lifted,  and 
pushed,  till  she  got  the  machine  up  the  bank  again,  and 
upon  the  roadway.  It  was  no  easy  matter,  however,  and 
by  the  time  the  roller  was  back  in  place,  the  bow  of  the 
brig  was  aground.  She  passed  him  a  cable  then,  and, 


122     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

making  it  fast  to  the  roller's  boiler,  she  told  him  to  go 
ahead. 

The  steam-roller  pulled  and  pulled,  and    tugged    and 
strained,  till  the  brig  feared  that  the  rope  would  part,  but 


she  was  gradually  moved  out  of  the  water,  up  the  bank, 
and  finally  reached  the  new  road. 

"Ugh  !"  she  said.  "  It  hurts,  rather,  but  I  don't  care; 
I'm  bound  to  see  this  City  o'  Ligg  I've  heard  so  much 
about ;  so  go  ahead,  Roly,  and  warp  me  up  to  the  Park." 

They  started  for  the  city,  the  roller  puffing,  hissing,  and 


THE    BOTHERSOME    BRIG.       123 

rattling,  and  the  keel  of  the  brig  scraping  along  the 
gravel  road,  lurching  this  way  and  that,  poking  her  mast 
heads  through  the  windows  of  the  houses  occasionally, 
and  catching  her  yards  in  the  lamp  posts.  Altogether 
they  made  a  great  hullabaloo,  and  all  the  cabs,  omnibuses, 
and  street-cars  in  town  came  rolling  up  to  see  what  was 
the  matter.  They  jeered  at  the  steam-roller  with  great 
glee,  for  they  had  never  seen  him  work  so  hard.  He 
usually  was  seen  leisurely  smoking  and  waddling  slowly 
up  and  down  the  street,  stopping  to  rest  after  every  trip, 
like  a  fat  Dutchman  promenading  a  piazza  after  break- 
fast. 

"  Go  it,  Roly!"  they  cried;  and  so  the  brig  was 
followed  by  a  great  crowd  to  the  Town  Hall.  Here  the 
roller  stopped  to  get  his  breath.  "  This  is  the  Park,"  he 
said  ;  "  really,  this  is  all  there  is  worth  seeing  in  the  city. 
Don't  you  want  to  go  back  now  ?  " 

"  Not  much  !"  said  the  brig,  who  was  enjoying  herself 
thoroughly.  "  I  want  to  see  the  whole  town.  Let's  go 
up  Queer-street  !  "  The  vessel  pointed  up  a  little  road 
off  the  Common. 

The  steam-roller  grumbled  a  good  deal  at  this,  but  did 
not  dare  to  refuse,  and  so  they  plunged  up  Queer-street, 
the  brig  rolling  and  pitching  as  if  in  a  heavy  gale,  and  the 
indignant  houses,  who  had  never  seen  a  vessel  before  in 


i24     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

their   lives,  expostulating  at    the   way  she    scraped   the 
paint  off  their  faces  and  broke  their  windows. 

Now,  not  far  from  the  church  by  the  Park,  Queer-street 
makes  a  turn  at  nearly  right  angles,  and  when  they  got 
to  this  point,  it  was  impossible  to  get  the  brig  round  the 
corner,  and  she  stuck  fast,  jammed  in  between  the  houses 
on  either  side  of  the  street,  being  able  to  go  neither  for- 
ward or  back. 

"  Now  how  are  you  going  to  get  out  ?  "  said  the  steam- 
roller. "  It's  all  your  fault,  for  you  would  come  up  Queer- 
street.  I  can't  pull  you  any  farther  ! " 

There  was  a  house  being  built  behind  the  telegraph 
office,  and  there  was  a  huge  scaffolding,  with  a  platform 
and  a  tall  derrick  on  top.  The  derrick  swung  its  arm 
round  over  Queer-street,  and  it  cried,  "  What's  the 
matter  down  there  ?  What  in  the  world  is  that  ship 
doing  in  the  City,  anyway  ?  " 

"  I'm  not  a  ship  ;  I'm  a  brig,"  said  the  vessel.  "  Don't 
you  see  that  I  have  only  two  masts  ?  I  wonder  that  I 
have  any  left  at  all,  after  this  tight  squeeze;  it's  worse 
than  being  caught  in  the  ice  !  " 

"  Oh,  I'll  lift  you  out,"  said  the  derrick,  good-humouredly, 
much  amused  at  seeing  a  sailing  vessel, on  such  very  dry 
land.  "See  here,  you  pass  this  rope  around  your  waist, 
and  I'll  get  you  out." 


THE    BOTHERSOME    BRIG.       125 

So  the  brig  tied  the  rope  round  her  hull,  and  the  der- 
rick lifted  her  bodily  out  of  Queer-street,  and  then, 
swinging  round,  lowered  her  gently  into  the  main  street 
again,  opposite  the  Park.  Meanwhile,  the  lazy  steam- 
roller, seeing  that,  in  the  excitement,  he  was  not  observed, 
rumbled  away,  and  got  back  to  the  new  road  by  the  river 
as  fast  as  he  could. 

The  brig  was  now  high  and  dry  in  the  middle  of  the 
main  street,  blocking  the  traffic,  and  unable  to  move  an 
inch,  for  none  of  the  motor  cars  was  half  strong  enough 
to  pull  her  out  of  the  way.  This  would  never  do,  how- 
ever, and  all  the  vehicles  in  town  protested  against  the 
obstruction.  The  trains  were  blocked  in  a  line  nearly  a 
mile  long,  when  the  little  boy  named  Yak  came  along. 

"  Why  don't  you  get  out  of  the  road,  brig  ?"  said  Yak. 
"You've  no  business  lying  here  in  the  fairway  !" 

"  There's  wind  enough,"  said  the  brig,  "  but  the  water 
is  too  shallow  !  I'm  hard  aground  !  " 

Then  Yak  went  to  see  the  Mayor.  "  I'll  get  the  brig 
out  of  the  road,  if  you'll  order  all  the  lamp  posts  in  town 
to  help  me,"  he  said. 

"  All  right,"  said  the  Mayor,  and  he  made  out  the  order. 
When  all  the  lamp  posts  were  assembled  in  the  Park,  Yak 
had  their  lamps  removed,  and  led  them  along  the  street, 
and  made  them  lie  clown  in  the  middle  of  the  road,  the 


126     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

first  one  directly  under  the  brig's  cut-water,  and  the 
others  along  down  the  street  as  far  as  the  river. 

Yak  then  boarded  the  brig  and  helped  her  set  her  sails. 
When  her  canvas  was  all  unfurled- he  cried  to  the  motor 
cars  behind  to  push  as  hard  as  they  could.  The  brig 
moved  forward  and  soon  touched  the  first  lamp  post  which 
rolled  under  her  keel,  and  after  that  she  went  forward 
easily,  under  full  sail  with  a  fair  wind,  down  the  main 
street  of  the  City  o'  Ligg. 

The  lamp  posts  made  a  great  outcry  at  this,  and  whined 
dismally  ;  but,  of  course,  being  of  cast  iron,  they  were  not 
really  hurt  at  all.  Now,  Yak  had  laid  them  in  the  road 
very  carefully,  ten  pointing  to  the  right  and  the  next  ten 
pointing  to  the  left,  head  to  head,  or,  rather,  where  their 
heads  would  have  been  if  the  lamps  had  not  been 
removed.  In  this  way,  the  posts  being  larger  round  at 
one  end  than  the  other,  the  brig  sailed  forward  in  curves, 
first  to  port  and  then  to  starboard,  as  if  she  were  tacking 
and  beating  against  a  head  wind.  As  she  zigzagged 

o          o  o        o  *_> 

down  the  street  all  the  windows  waved  their  curtains  at 
her,  and  the  motor  cars  in  her  wake  set  up  a  hilarious 
toot-tooting.  There  had  never  such  a  gay  sight  been  seen 
on  the  streets  of  the  lively  City  o'  Ligg. 

But  there  was  one  tiling  that  Yak  had  forgotten.      He 

o  o 

had  laid  the  posts  along  the  main  street  to  the  river  very 


THE    BOTHERSOME    BRIG.        127 

cleverly,  but  he  had  not  remembered  that  it  was  above 
the  bridge,  and  so,  when  the  brig,  amid  the  cheers  of  the 
waggons  and  motor  cars,  took  her  triumphant  plunge  into 
the  stream  and,  happy  to  feel  again  the  soft,  cool  splashing 
of  the  water  along  her  keel,  set  off  gaily  towards  the 
harbour,  she  brought  up,  bang  !  against  the  old  bridge  and 
nearly  lost  her  foretopmast  !  It  was  no  use,  she  could 
never  get  down  the  river  to  the  sea  again. 

And  so  there  the  bothersome  little  brig  remains,  a  cap- 
tive in  the  river  Wob,  like  an  insane  lioness,  a  prisoner  in 
the  cage  of  a  menagerie,  sailing  back  and  forth  all  day 
long,  from  one  year's  end  to  another. 


THE  HOUSE  WHO  WALKED 
IN  HER  SLEEP. 


O 


- 


THERE  had  always  been  a  good  deal  of  gossip  about 
the  little  white  house  with  the  green  blinds,  ever  since 
she  had  moved  to  the  City  o'  Ligg.     A  great   many  of 
the  buildings  were  distrustful  of  her,  and  they  whispered  ' 
all  sorts  of  things  to  each  other. 

To  be  sure,  the  little  house  had  always  behaved  with 
the  greatest  propriety,  but  there  was  much  comment  upon 
the  fact  that  she  had  no  stable,  which  the  buildings 
regarded  as  suspicious  !  There  had  once  been  a  stable 
where  she  stood,  but  it  had  mysteriously  disappeared 
long  ago. 

Besides  this,  none  of  the  other  houses  knew  exactly 
where  she  had  come  from.  She  replied,  vaguely,  "From 
the  country,"  when  any  oj"  '  uildings  asked  her  directly, 
but  this  was  undoubteu.)  an  evasion.  It  was,  moreover, 


132      THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'LIGG. 

not  easy  to  question  the  demure  little  white  house  with 
the  green  blinds,  for  she  had  away  of  making  the  others 
think  that  perhaps  it  was  none  of  their  business,  after  all. 

But  when,  one  morning,  the  houses  woke  up  and  found 
that  the  little  house,  who  had  been  white  the  day  before, 
had  turned  blue,  there  was  great  excitement  among  the 
buildings  of  the  City  o'  Ligg.  None  of  them  dared  ask 
her  the  reason  why  she  had  changed  her  coat,  nor  how 
she  had  done  it  so  quickly,  but  the  houses  fairly  hummed 
with  gossip,  and  the  story  was  told  from  one  street  to  an- 
other. That  happened  on  Monday  morning,  and  they 
were  still  more  surprised  when,  on  Tuesday  morning,  they 
found  the  little  house  was  yellow! 

Surely  something  must  be  done  about  it,  and  so  an  old 
baker's  shop  asked  her  to  explain  how  and  why  she  had 
changed  colour  during  the  night.  The  little  house 
treated  the  shop  very  politely,  but  only  said  : 

"  Upon  my  word,  I  honestly  have  no  idea  how  the 
thing  happened !  I  went  to  sleep  quite  as  usual,  and 
when  I  woke  up  in  the  morning  I  was  a  different  colour. 
If  you  can  explain  it,  I'd  be  very  glad  to  know  myself  !  " 

The  houses  all  scoffed  at  the  idea  of  her  being  so  inno- 
cent. Of  course  she  knew  all  about  it,  and  she  ought  to 
be  exposed,  for  it  would  not  clo  to  let  such  a  scandal  go 
on  !  So  they  sent  to  the  Police  Station  and  complained 


HOUSE  WALK  ED  IN  HER  SLEEP.    133 

of  the  little  house,  and  that  night  she  was  carefully 
watched  by  a  very  respectable  old  Church. 

At  midnight  the  Church  saw  the  little  house  give  a 
shudder,  and  move  uneasily  on  her  foundations.  But 
her  windows  were  blank  and  without  expression  ;  she 
was  undoubtedly  asleep  !  The  little  house's  door  yawned, 
and  she  slowly  began  to  stir.  She  crawled  down  towards 
the  rear  of  the  yard,  and  began  moving  through  the  gar- 
den and  across  the  fields. 

The  old  Church  followed  her  as  she  made  her  way  out 
of  town  into  the  open  country.  They  came  at  last  to  a 
range  of  low  hills.  The  further  side  of  these  hills  was 
dotted  with  patches  of  woods,  between  which  the  little 
house  went,  till  at  last  she  came  to  the  shore  of  a  small 
lake  of  red  paint. 

The  Church  hid  behind  a  clump  of  trees  and  peeped 
out  to  see  what  the  little  house  would  do  next.  What 
was  his  astonishment  to  see  her  sit  down  on  the  bank  be- 
side the  red  lake  and  calmly  take  off  all  her  doors  and  all 
her  blinds  and  then  plunge  into  the  paint  !  Her  windows, 
however,  were  still  blank  and  shut ;  there  was  no  doubt 
about  it ;  the  little  house  was  swimming  in  her  sleep  ! 

After  staying  in  the  red  paint  for  about  half  an  hour,  the 
house  came  on  shore  again  and  stood  in  the  moonlight, 
all  red  and  dripping.  When  she  had  dried,  she  put  on 


134     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

her  blinds  and  doors,  smoothed  down  her  slates,  and  pro- 
ceeded home,  followed  by  the  astounded  Church. 

The  next  day  he  told  the  Post  Office  the  whole  story, 
and  they  consulted  together  as  to  what  should  be  done 
about  the  matter.  Surely  this  sort  of  thing  should  not 
be  allowed  to  go  on.  They  decided,  therefore,  to  appeal 
to  the  Police  Station,  who  directed  that  a  high  fence  be 
be  built  around  the  little  house,  and  that  night  all  three 
of  them  sat  up  to  watch. 

At  midnight,  as  before,  the  little  house  began  to  stir. 
She  moved  over  to  the  fence  in  the  rear  of  the  yard,  and 
seemed  at  first  unable  to  understand  what  stopped  her 
progress.  But  then  she  ran  against  the  fence,  pushed  it 
violently  down,  and  escaped,  followed  by  the  Church,  the 
Post  Office,  and  the  Police  Station. 

Over  the  hills  and  through,  the  woods  they  chased  the 
little  house,  but  this  time  she  took  a  slightly  different  di- 
rection, which  led  her  finally  to  a  lake  of  green  paint. 
Here  the  same  thing  happened  as  before,  to  the  great 
astonishment  and  embarrassment  of  the  three  spectators. 

So  this  was  how  the  little  house  was  able  to  afford  a 
different  coat  of  paint  every  night  \s  The  three  buildings 
that  watched  her  would  have  gone  bathing  in  the  lake 
themselves,  no  doubt,  but  none  of  them  could  swim,  at 
least,  not  while  awake ;  there  is  no  knowing  what  they 
might  have  been  able  to  do  in  their  sleep. 


HOUSE  WALKED  IN  HER  SLEEP.    135 


The  next  night  the  little  house  went  to  a  lake  of  brown 
paint.  By  this  time  the  whole  City  o'  Ligg  was  excited 
about  her,  and  all  sorts  of  rumours  were  floating  around 
the  streets  and  avenues.  Some  buildings  said  the  little 
house  was  in  love  with  a  paint  mill,  who  gave  her  a  new 


coat  every  night ;  but  why  the  house's  blinds  and  doors 
were  always  green,  no  one  but  the  Church,  the  Post  Office, 
and  the  Police  Station  could  explain. 

At  last  the  fact  leaked  out  that  the  little  house  was  a 


i36     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

somnambulist,  and  went  a-swimming  in  lakes  of  coloured 
paints,  and  that  night  the  whole  City  o'  Ligg  followed 
her  when  she  started  out  at  midnight.  They  streamed 
across  the  fields  and  hills  after  her — houses,  churches, 
stores,  shops,  inns,  factories,  public  buildings  and  edifices 
of  every  description,  till  where  the  City  o'  Ligg  had  been 
was  nothing  but  one  big  honeycomb  of  cellars,  and  all  to 
see  a  poor  little  house  go  swimming ! 

This  time  she  led  them  to  a  beautiful  purple  lake,  and 
while  the  thousands  of  buildings  xvaited  upon  the  bank, 
she  took  off  her  doors  and  took  off  her  blinds,  and 
splashed  and  spattered  in  the  paint,  as  if  she  were  a  hun- 
dred miles  from  the  nearest  house,  and  quite  alone  in 
the  forest ! 

Suddenly  in  diving  she  struck  something  hard  on  the 
bottom,  and  feeling  for  it  caught  hold  and  dragged  it  to 
the  surface  and  pulled  it  ashore.  It  was  her  long-lost 
stable ! 

The  stable  immediately  awoke  her,  and  the  thousand 
spectators  shook  with  laughter  to  see  the  bewilderment 
of  the  little  house.  The  two  dripping  purple  buildings, 
however,  were  too  happy  to  notice  the  peeping  audience 
behind  the  trees,  and  they  embraced  each  other  with 
touching  fondness.  They  then  sat  down  and,  after  blow- 
ing the  purple  paint  out  of  their  chimneys,  told  each 


HOUSE  WALKED  IN   HERSLEEP.    137 

other  the  stories  of  their  lives,  since  they  had  been 
separated. 

The  buildings  on  shore  became,  now,  so  much 
ashamed  of  their  cruel  and  unjust  suspicions,  and  so 
affected  by  the  happiness  of  the  little  house  that,  one  by 
one,  they  stole  away  to  the  City  o'  Ligg,  and  decided  not 
to  say  anything  to  the  little  house  about  their  own  dis- 
graceful part  of  the  affair. 

And  so  when  the  house  and  her  faithful  stable  returned 
to  town  and  took  their  old  places,  no  one  asked  the 
explanation  of  her  new  coat  or  her  new  stable.  There 
they  stand  to  this  day,  and  these  loving  purple  buildings 
are  the  most  respected  edifices  in  the  whole  of  the  City  o' 


THE    BOLD    BALLOON 


THE  flock  of  balloons  who  dwelt  up  in  the  mountains 
to  the  North-east  o'  Ligg  was  cordially  hated  by  all  the 
inhabitants  of  the  City.  They  were  a  lazy,  useless  lot, 
and  never  did  anything  but  amuse  themselves.  They 
were  all  fat,  and  generally  very  prosperous,  but  they 
were  by  no  means  intelligent,  and  the  citizens  in  town 
called  them  mere  "  bags  of  wind." 

There  was  one  amongst  the  flock  who  was  particularly 
disliked,  for  he  was  almost  the  only  one  who  ever  came 
into  town,  and  when  he  did  it  was  always  for  some  mis- 
chief. The  City  clocks  used  to  make  faces  at  him  when 
they  saw  him  coming,  but  he  paid  them  well  for  that  by 
twisting  their  hands  round  the  wrong  way,  till  they 
struck  all  sorts  of  hours  at  once.  When  you  heard  a 
church  chime  ring  out  six  bells  in  the  middle  of  the  day, 


• 


144     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

you  might  be  sure  that  the  bad  balloon  was  in  town,  and 
up  to  his  old  pranks. 

The  balloon,  however,  preferred  tickling  big  heavy 
churches  in  the  small  of  their  ridgepoles  till  their  steeples 
writhed.  When  he  was  not  doing  that,  he  was  usually 
dropping  stones  on  the  roofs,  or  emptying  sandbags  into 
chimneys,  and  pretending  it  was  only  an  accident.  He 
was  very  careful  not  to  interfere  with  the  windmills,  how- 
ever, for  once  when  he  was  trying  to  annoy  one  she  struck 
at  him  savagely  with  her  arms,  and  wounded  his  basket 
so  that  he  didn't  dare  to  come  into  the  City  o'  Ligg  for 
several  weeks. 

His  tricks  became  such  a  nuisance,  finally,  that  the 
houses  insisted  that  he  must  be  captured.  It  was  hardly 
safe  to  go  to  sleep  at  night,  for  fear  of  that  bad  balloon 
coming  round  your  roof  and  scratching  your  tiles  the 
wrong  way. 

They  prevailed  upon  the  Fire  Department  to  try  to 
catch  him,  and  the  engines  tired  themselves  out  squirting 
at  the  balloon.  When,  at  last,  they  did  succeed  in  turn- 
ing a  stream  of  water  on  him,  he  only  laughed  at  them. 
He  was  made  of  oiled  silk,  and  was  used  to  being  rained 
on,  and  didn't  mind  having  a  bath  in  the  least. 

The  artillery  tried  next,  but  they  couldn't  come  any- 
where near  hitting  him.  Besides,  the  cannon  balls  that 


THE  BOLD  BALLOON.  145 

they  fired  into  the  air  had  come  down  again,  and  they 
usually  came  down  upon  the  roofs  of  the  houses,  which 
was  a  good  deal  worse  than  being  scratched  by  a  com- 
paratively harmless  balloon,  or  even  hit  with  his  drag- 
anchor. 

The  houses  had  given  up  all  hopes  of  catching  the 
balloon,  when  he  got  himself  into  worse  trouble  than 
they  had  been  able  to  make  for  him.  He  came  in  one 
day,  and  was  having  great  fun  with  the  Town  Hall,  when 
a  gust  of  wind  struck  him,  and  blew  him  past  the  cupola, 
and,  the  first  thing  the  balloon  knew,  he  was  punctured 
by  the  weather  vane,  which  tore  a  great  rent  in  his  side. 

The  gas  slowly  oozed  out  of  the  silken  bag  of  the 
balloon,  and  he  collapsed  and  fainted  dead  away.  There 
was  great  rejoicing  among  the  houses  at  this.  Noth- 
ing could  have  been  more  fortunate  for  them,  or  worse 
for  the  balloon.  A  long  ladder  finally  succeeded  in  get- 
ting him  down  from  the  cupola,  and  he  was  left  in  the 
street  until  the  buildings  should  decide  what  to  do  with 
him. 

The  balloon  recovered  his  senses  late  that  evening,  and 
found  himself  alone,  lying  in  the  street  in  front  of  the 
Town  Hall.  He  bewailed  his  fate  bitterly  with  what 
strength  was  left  him,  and  thought  what  a  fool  he  had 
been  to  come  into  the  town  when  he  mieht  now  have  been 


i46     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

playing  amongst  the  clouds  and  the  rainbows  high  above 
the  mountains  outside  the  City  o'  Ligg !  He  tried  to 
turn  over,  but  his  wound  pained  him  and  his  basket  was 
sore  from  being  thrown  down  from  the  cupola. 

He  lay  there  for  a  while,  moaning  softly,  when  it 
seemed  to  him  that  he  smelled  gas  somewhere  about,  and 
this  hope  immediately  revived  his  spirits.  He  lifted  him- 
self as  well  as  he  could  and  looked  about  him.  Only  a 
few  feet  away  from  where  he  was  lying  he  saw  a  great  hole 
in  the  street.  He  crawled  over  to  this  and  looked  in. 
What  was  his  excitement  to  see  down  in  the  hole  a  gas- 
pipe  that  was  being  repaired  ! 

He  got  his  basket  and  his  anchor  down  into  the  hole 
and  worked  away  with  all  his  might.  It  was  getting  light 
now,  and  if  he  was  to  escape  at  all  he  must  hurry,  for  he 
was  sure  that  in  the  morning  they  would  send  for  a 
mowing  machine  and  cut  him  up  into  little  pieces. 

After  an  hour's  hard  work  he  had  bitten  completely 
through  the  gas-pipe,  and  had  laid  his  valve  over  the 
orifice.  Slowly  his  silken  bag  filled  with  gas,  and  his 
strength  returned.  But  try  as  he  might  he  found  he 
could  not  fill  himself  more  than  half-full,  and  so,  at  last, 
fearful  of  being  discovered,  he  wobbled  away  down  the 
street  as  fast  as  he  could,  flapping  and  waving,  the  most 
disreputable  balloon  imaginable.  He  made  his  way  to- 


THE  BOLD  BALLOON. 

wards  the  country,  but,  after  travelling  a  mile  or  so,  he 
found  he  could  go  no  further,  as  he  leaked  so  badly. 

He  had  reached  a  farm-house  on  the  road  to  the  hills, 
and  rustled  into  the  yard  to  see  whom  he  could  find  to 
help  him.  In  the  yard  was  a  rusty  sewing  machine. 


"  Good  morning,"  said  the  balloon. 
"How  do  you  do?"  replied  the  machine;  "and  who 
are  you  ?  " 


148     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

"  I  am  a  circus  tent,  and  I've  come  to  ask  you  to  sew 
me  up,  please.  A  steam  calliope  ran  into  me,  and  tore 
this  big  rent,  as  you  see  !  "  And  the  half-empty  balloon 
made  himself  stiff  and  angular  to  look  like  a  tent. 

"  Where  is  your  pole  ?"  said  the  sewing  machine. 

"  Oh,  I  broke  my  pole,"  said  the  balloon. 

"  What  are  you  going  to  do  with  that  basket  ?  "  said 
the  machine. 

"  Never  mind  ;  will  you  help  me  or  not?" 

"  I'll  help  you  on  one  condition,  and  that  is  that  you  go 
to  the  Electric  Power  House  and  steal  a  little  dynamo  to 
be  my  slave.  I  always  did  want  to  be  run  by  electricity  ! " 

As  she  absolutely  refused  to  sew  him  up  till  he  had 
done  this,  the  balloon  had  to  stay  there  till  the  next  night, 
and  then  hobble  back  into  town,  and  try  to  kidnap  the 
dynamo.  He  set  out  as  soon  as  it  was  dark,  and  by  mid- 
night he  had  got  to  the  Power  House. 

It  was  very  dark  inside,  for  the  electric  lights  always 
went  out  at  twelve  o'clock,  and  he  got  in  through  the 
doors  they  had  left  open,  making  himself  as  small  as  pos- 
sible in  the  hallway,  squeezing  through  passages  with 
great  difficulty  and  pain. 

He  had  just  reached  the  dynamo  room,  when  a  sizzling 
blue  flame  flashed,  and  he  fell  on  the  floor  with  a  stinging 
pain  darting  through  him,  while  the  air  seemed  full  of 


THEBOLDBALLOON.  149 

violet  sparks.  He  had  stumbled  across  a  live  wire  and 
had  received  a  terrible  shock. 

In  the  morning  they  found  him  there  unconscious,  but 
he  never  recovered,  and  expired  without  knowing  what 
had  killed  him. 

It  was  rather  a  disappointment  to  the  Fire  Department, 
for  they  had  decided  to  harness  and  halter  the  balloon, 
and  tie  him  up  above  the  Park  by  a  long  rope,  so  that  he 
might  be  used  to  hold  their  hose  when  the  tops  of  the 
houses  caught  fire. 


THE    LAZY    LAMPPOSTS 


.ETT    BUR.GESS 


THE  lamp  posts  on  Queer-street  were  the  most  dis- 
orderly in  the  whole  City  o'  Ligg.  They  went  out  when 
they  should  have  been  attending  to  duty,  they  smoked, 
and  they  gambolled.  In  other  parts  of  town  the  lamp 
posts  were  sedate  and  well-behaved,  and  stood  in  perfectly 
straight  rows,  like  columns  of  soldiers  marching  down 
the  streets.  They  tried  by  every  argument  they  could 
think  of  to  make  the  Queer-street  lamp  posts  behave 
properly. 

"  See  here,"  said  the  elder  ones,  "you  fellows  think 
you  are  awfully  clever  and  smart,  I  suppose,  to  cut  up 
such  shines,  but  you'll  be  taken  clown,  some  day,  and 
they'll  put  up  electric  light  poles  instead,  the  first  thin:;- 
you  know  !  Then  you'll  wish  you  had  behaved  !  You're 


154     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

getting  us  all  into  trouble,  and  you  ought  to  be  ashamed 
of  yourselves  !  " 

But  the  Queer-street  lamp  posts  flared  up  at  this  ;  they 
made  light  of  the  rebuke,  and  said  "  they  didn't  care, 
they  were  going  to  have  their  fun  while  they  were  young, 
and  the  other  fellows  could  just  shut  up  preaching  like 
prigs!" 

So  they  lolled  and  loafed  around  on  the  corners,  and 
winked  at  the  hansom  cabs  as  they  passed  by,  and  bowed 
mockingly  to  the  omnibuses,  and  they  beckoned  to  the 
bicycles  with  their  little  short  arms,  till  they  made  a  great 
scandal  of  their  behaviour  throughout  the  whole  City  o' 


One  dark  night,  one  of  the  silliest  of  them  suggested 
that  they  should  all  go  to  the  Park,  and  play  hide-and-seek. 
No  sooner  was  this  foolishness  proposed  than  the  whole 
twenty-seven  lamp  posts  started  in  a  tipsy  procession 
down  Queer-street,  jostling  each  other,  knocking  each 
other  down,  scrambling,  waltzing,  reeling,  climbing  ^n 
top  of  each  others'  shoulders,  jumping  fences,  ringing 
door-bells,  rollicking,  frollicking,  bouncing,  jouncing, 
hopping,  flopping  in  the  wildest  kind  of  a  hullabaloo,  to- 
wards the  Park.  They  were  like  a  lot  of  puppies  that 
had  just  been  unmuzzled. 

Then  they  began  the  tipsiest  game    of  hide-and-seek 


THE    LAZY    LAMPPOSTS.         155 

that  ever  was  played.  All  but  one  put  out  their  lights, 
and  that  one  chased  the  others  all  over  the  Common. 
They  jumped  over  trees,  and  they  crawled  under  benches  ; 
they  got  up  on  the  roof  of  the  Grand  Band  Stand,  and 
they  hid  in  the  Frog  Pond,  and  stuck  their  lanterns  out 
of  water  to  watch. 

While  the  fun  was  at  its  height,  a  little  policeman  sud- 
denly appeared  and  arrested  the  whole  twenty-seven,  and 
tied  them  together  by  threes.  Then  he  opened  a  sewer- 
pipe  and  locked  them  in,  while  he  went  for  help. 

Now,  the  sewer-pipe  led  to  the  river,  emptying  into  it 
about  a  mile  or  two  below  the  City  o'  Ligg.  The  lamp 
posts  succeeded  in  untying  their  fastenings,  and  imme- 
diately began  to  crawl  through  the  slimy  hole,  in  the 
dark,  one  behind  the  other,  and,  after  many  hours,  they 
crawled  out  upon  a  sand  bar,  in  the  middle  of  the  river, 
half  drowned,  and  as  dirty  as  worms. 

They  would  have  stayed  on  the  island  till  they  froze  to 
<f">ath,  if  it  hadn't  happened  that  a  tug  came  along  just 
then.  Of  course,  they  didn't  dare  to  go  back  to  the  City 
after  such  an  escapade,  but  they  didn't  know  where  else 
to  go.  Now  the  tugs  in  the  river  Wob  were  not  noted 
for  their  good-nature,  and  the  lamp  posts  might  have 
known,  if  they  had  not  been  such  giddy,  light-headed 
things,  that  tu^s  were  not  to  be  trusted. 


156     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

The  tug  whistled  to  them,  tl  Hallo  !  what  are  you 
muddy  lamp  posts  doing  there  on  that  bar  ?  " 

The  lamp  post  who  had  first  suggested  the  lark 
answered,  "  We  set  out  to  have  a  torch-light  procession, 
but  we  got  lost." 


The  tug  pretended  to  believe  this  very  improbable 
story,  and  cried,  "You  come  and  get  aboard  me,  and  I'll 
take  you  to  a  good  place  where  you  can  get  plenty  of 
oil !  " 

So  the  twenty-seven  climbed  aboard  over  each  other's 
shoulders,  and  the  tug  put  off  down  stream.  As  they 


THELAZYLAMPPOSTS.  157 

reached  the  harbour,  the  little  vessel  began  to  roll  fright- 
fully, and  the  posts  became  exceedingly  seasick.  Some 
of  them  tried  to  get  off  to  wade  ashore,  but  the  water 
was  so  deep  that  they  were  afraid. 

Finally,  the  tug  steamed  up  to  an  island  where  there 
was  a  white  revolving  lighthouse,  and  rolled  them  all 
into  shallow  water,  and  shot  away  hissing  and  bubbling 
with  laughter.  They  all  struggled  ashore,  and  waited  on 
the  beach,  wondering  where  they  were  and  what  to  do. 

As  the  lighthouse  turned  slowly  around,  like  a  search- 
light, its  rays  flashed  upon  the  group  of  homesick, 
seasick,  shivering  lamp  posts,  and  he  called  out,  "  Hallo ! 
come  up  here,  whoever  you  are  ! " 

The  posts  struggled  across  the  sand  of  the  island,  very 
much  ashamed  of  themselves. 

"  Well,  well,"  said  the  tower,  "you  are  a  queer  set  of 
little  lighthouses,  you  are  !  Who  are  you,  anyway?" 

The  spokesman  of  the  party  told  him  their  story,  and 
begged  the  lighthouse  to  give  them  oil,  for  their  lamps 
were  almost  famished.  This  the  lighthouse  did,  for  he 
was  a  good  old  soul,  and  had  been  young  himself.  The 
lamp  posts  drank  the  oil  greedily,  and  they  grew  brighter. 

While  they  were  thus  engaged  there  was  a  cry  from 
the  tower.  "  Oh,  heavens,"  the  lighthouse  cried,  "  some- 
thing has  happened  to  me  ;  I  can't  revolve  !  What  shall 


158     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'LIGG. 

I  do  ?  There's  a  man-o'-war  due  into  the  harbour,  and 
she'll  go  on  the  bar  if  she  can't  see  my  light !  There  ! 
Look!  There  are  her  rockets,  now!  Heavens!  what 
shall  I  do?'1 

The  lamp  posts  looked  up,  and  there  was  a  blue  light 
off  by  the  bar,  sure  enough.  They  consulted  together 
hastily.  Here  was  their  time  to  retrieve  their  good  name. 
They  would  go  out  and  save  the  man-o'-war!  It  would 
be  a  dangerous  venture,  for  the  tide  was  running 
swiftly ;  but  they  could  do  no  less  than  try. 

They  ran  as  fast  as  they  could  down  to  the  beach  op- 
posite the  bar,  and,  wading  in  boldly,  carefully  pushed 
their  way  through  the  waves.  At  every  step  the  water 
grew  deeper,  and  they  feared  that  every  moment  some 
billow  would  put  out  their  lights  and  wash  them  off  their 
feet.  But  they  kept  on  bravely,  and  at  last  the  water 
grew  shallower,  and  they  reached  the  buoyin  the  middle 
of  the  bar,  waist-deep  in  the  rushing  tide. 

The  buoy  was  ringing  the  bell  with  all  her  might. 
"  Good  work !  "  she  cried.  "  Now  stand  in  a  thick  group 
altogether,  and  the  ship  will  see  you." 

There  they  stood,  the  twenty-seven  courageous  lamp 
posts,  like  a  hollow  square  of  soldiers,  slanting  this  way 
and  that,  as  the  waves  broke  over  them,  their  flames 
flaring  and  flashing  in  the  gusts  of  wind,  and  the  sand 


THE  LAZY  LAMPPOSTS.  159 

crawling  under  their  feet.  At  last  the  tide  turned,  and  it 
was  more  comfortable. 

"  Boom  \  "  went  the  gun  from  the  man-o'-war. 
"Thanks!" 

The  lighthouse,  which  had  now  fully  recovered  itself, 
and  was  able  to  revolve,  flashed  convulsively,  as  if  it  were 
sobbing  with  emotion  and  gratitude. 

As  soon  as  the  ship  had  come  to  anchor,  she  sent  a 
launch  out  to  the  bar,  and  took  the  twenty-seven  lamp 
posts  on  board,  proud  and  happy,  but  very  wet  and  cold. 

"Good-bye  !"  they  cried  to  the  bell-buoy. 

"  Good-bye  ! "  she  replied,  and  nodded  a  farewell. 

They  were  carried  up  to  the  City  o'  Ligg  in  triumph, 
by  the  very  tug  who  had  betrayed  them,  and  were  met  by 
the  Mayor  and  populace  with  a  brass  band.  They  were 
marched  into  the  Park,  opposite  the  Town  Hall,  where 
they  received  a"  little  lecture,  but  were  forgiven  for  their 
noble  service,  and  sent  back  to  Queer-street,  where  they 
have  behaved  themselves  perfectly,  ever  since. 


THE  BICYCLE'S  FAMILY. 


CELETT  BURGESS 


THE  bicycles  were*  perhaps,  the  cleverest  and  best 
educated  members  of  the  inorganic  society  of  the  City  o' 
Ligg.  The  bicycles  looked  down  upon  the  tricycles,  and, 
in  fact,  upon  all  three  and  four-wheeled  vehicles,  and  they 
did  not  associate  even  with  hansom  cabs,  who  wore  their 
wheels  side  by  side. 

Mr.   Diamond  Frame  was  a  leader  in  bicycle  circles, 

and  was  proud  of  his  family  and  connections.      He  was 

mechanically   perfect,    a  very  high-grade  wheel,  and  his 

father,  Kangaroo,  was  one  of  the  original  Safeties,  while, 

on  his  mother's  side,  he  was  descended  from  one  of  the 

'  rv  best  High  Wheel  Ordinaries,   in  the  early  clays  of 

id    rubber  tyres.     From  him,  he  traced   his    ancestry 

back  through  the   Boneshakers  and  the  Velocipedes,  for 

an  hundred  years  or  more. 


1 66     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

Mr.  Diamond  Frame,  when  quite  young,  married  a 
charming  female  Drop  Frame  cycle,  a  first-class  wheel  in 
every  respect.  She  was  very  beautiful,  and  wore,  on  her 
wedding-day,  a  coat  of  white  enamel,  with  full  nickel 
trimmings. 

After  a  year  or  so  he  became  the  father  of  the  prettiest 


GB 


of  little  tandem  twins,  a  combination  couplet,  of  which  he 
and  the  mother  were  both  fond  and   proud.      But   their 
next  child  was  more  of  a  trial,  and  very  hard  to  manage 
He  grew  up  to  be  a  very  sporty  machine,  this  little  Dia- 


THE    BICYCLE'S    FAMILY.          167 

mond  Frame — he  was  a  handsome  racing  wheel,  with 
slender,  light  tubes,  and  a  sprocket  geared  up  to  a  fright- 
ful speed.  He  "  scorched  "  shockingly,  and  was  brought 
home  broken  or  punctured  almost  every  week.  The 
father  and  mother  were  much  distressed  about  his  be- 
haviour, and  dreaded  to  hear  his  bell  ring  after  a  long 
trip,  fearing  he  had  come  back  with  a  fractured  fork  or  a 
broken  crank. 

But  the  little  Drop  Frame  daughter,  who  was  born 
later,  was  her  parents'  favourite.  She  was  a  beautiful 
model,  a  modern  chainless  type,  with  narrow  treads  to 
her  tyres,  and  altogether  an  up-to-date,  stylish  machine. 
Their  hopes  were  set  on  an  ambitious  marriage  for  her, 
for  the»Frames  were  rich,  and  able  to  give  her  a  generous 
dowry. 

When  the  father  mentioned  the  matter  to  her,  how- 
ever, he  found  that  she  had  been  indiscreet  enough  to 
have  formed  an  attachment  for  an  unspeakably  low-grade 
wheel — a  machine  with  no  distinguished  name-plate,  and 
who  dressed  in  maroon-enamel  and  carried  gear  case, 
spatter-flap,  a  long  pump,  and  mud  guards. 

The  son  agreed  with  the  father,  that  such  a  marriage 
was  impossible,  and  promised  to  do  what  he  could  to  pre- 
vent the  match.  He  had  begun  to  affect  ram's  horn 
handles  and  toe-clips,  and  sported  a  saddle  of  his  own 


1 68    THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

invention,  but  he  had  altogether  a  stronger  sprocket  than 
steering-head. 

His  style,  however,  soon  interested  a  very  aristocratic 
young  Motorcycle  whom  he  met  one  day  at  a  club  run. 
The  electric  wheel  had  just  come  from  Paris,  and  had  an 
immense  amount  of  manner.  He  was  a  second-hand  ma- 
chine, to  be  sure,  but  of  foreign  make,  and  a  Motorcycle 
at  that ;  surely  here  was  the  chance  to  marry  off  the  little 
Drop  Frame  with  a  fashionable  wedding ! 

The  Motorcycle,  however,  was  expensive,  and  needed 
much  inducement  to  agree.  It  took  a  long  while  to  ar- 
range the  preliminaries,  but  old  Diamond  Frame  finally 
agreed  to  pay  for  all  the  repairs  he  needed.  To  their 
astonishment,  however,  the  silly  little  Drop  Frame 
daughter  absolutely  refused  to  leave  her  beloved  third- 
class  wheel,  who,  she  asserted,  was  worth  two  of  any 
foreign  machines  ever  imported. 

Old  Diamond  Frame  argued  with  her  and  lectured  her 
and  implored  her,  but  all  to  no  purpose,  and  he  had 
about  made  up  his  mind  that  he  would  have  to  become 
the  father-in-law  of  a  cheap  domestic  pattern,  when  an 
unforeseen  accident  renewed  his  hopes  for  a  more  pleasant 
match. 

He  was  speeding  with  his  daughter  down  Queer-street 
at  a  fast  clip  one  day  when,  suddenly,  the  Drop  Frame's 


THE    BICYCLE'S    FAMILY.         169 

tyre  collapsed,  and  she  fainted  away.  She  was  taken 
into  a  repair  shop  to  be  pumped  up,  but  though  she  was 
rubbed  with  graphite  and  given  a  good  dose  of  oil,  she 
found  she  could  not  go,  and  the  father  decided  to  send 
her  to  a  cyclery  for  awhile. 

During  her  convalescence  she  was  taken  up  to  the 
school  for  beginners,  on  the  top  floor,  and  there,  to  her 
horror,  she  found  her  lover,  disgracefully  bobbing  round 
the  rink,  lurching  into  the  padded  walls  and  tumbling 
over  the  floor,  under  the  weight  of  a  fat  man,  learning  to 
ride.  To  complete  his  degradation,  the  miserable  ma- 
chine was  actually  wearing  a  brake.  A  man's  bicycle 
with  a  brake.  How  vulgar  !  How  effeminate  ! 

o 

The  sight  was  too  much  for  the  delicate  little  wheel, 
and  she  swooned  away,  and  had  to  be  completely  re- 
paired. After  her  recovery  she  gave  an  unwilling  con- 
sent to  being  engaged  to  the  Motorcycle,  and  the  day  for 
the  wedding  was  set. 

o 

But,  as  the  time  approached,  her  heart  began  to  soften 
toward  the  poor  lover  whom  she  had  rejected,  and  she 
often  wondered  if  he  were  happy.  She  contrasted  his 
affectionate  manner  with  the  snobbery  of  the  electric 
machine  whom  she  was,  so  soon,  to  call  her  husband. 
He  would  not  work  half  the  time.  It  needed  a  very 
large  repair  kit  to  satisfy  his  needs,  and  her  father  had 


1 70    THE    LIVELY    CITY    O '    LIGG. 

already  begun  to  complain  of  the  way  he  smoked  and 
the  liquid  fuel  he  required.  But  no  word  came  from  her 
maroon-coloured  lover,  and  she  had  given  herself  up  as 
lost,  when  a  second  accident  changed  her  whole  life. 

She  was  out  with  her  fianct,  one  evening,  and  had  just 
begun  to  descend  a  rather  stiff  hill,  when  her  brake  gave 
way,  and  she  lost  all  control  of  her  pedals.  "  Help  me  ! 
I'm  running  away  !"  she  shouted,  in  terror,  to  the  Motor- 
cycle, but  he,  fearing  to  trust  his  own  life  on  such  a  steep 
hill,  refused  to  go  after  her.  Faster  and  faster  she  flew 
down  the  slope,  and  she  saw  the  river  ahead  of  her. 
There  seemed  to  be  no  way  of  escaping  a  violent  death 
when,  with  a  whirr  and  a  rattle,  a  maroon-enamelled  ma- 
chine shot  after  her  at  terrific  speed.  He  charged  up 
to  her  and  caught  her  handles,  and  then,  setting  his 
brake  with  all  his  strength,  he  held  her  until  the  two 
came  to  a  stop  on  the  very  edge  of  the  river  bank.  It 
was  her  faithful  lover. 

Old  Diamond  Frame  was  overcome  with  gratitude 
when  he  heard  of  the  magnificent  bravery  and  devotion 
of  the  hitherto  despised  machine,  and,  as  he  was  indig- 
nant with  the  miserable  cowardice  of  the  Motorcycle,  as 
well,  he  and  his  wife  immediately  gave  their  consent  to 
the  marriage  of  their  daughter  to  her  rescuer  as  soon  as 
the  previous  engagement  had  been  cancelled. 


THE    BICYCLE'S    FAMILY.          171 

The  gallant  bicycle  was  given  a  new  coat  of  black 
enamel,  all  his  bearings  were  renewed,  and  his  nickel 
polished,  so  that  on  the  day  of  the  wedding  the  cycles 
said  they  had  never  seen  a  more  handsome  bride  and 
groom. 


THE    FLYING    STABLE. 


GELETT    BURGESS 


THE  little  red  stable  with  the  peaked  roof  which  lived 
on  Sly-street,  in  the  City  o'  Ligg,  was  not  very  well  liked 
by  its  neighbours.  There  was  a  good  deal  of  talk  about 
its  greed  and  vanity,  and  it  was  the  firm  belief  of  all  the 
houses  on  the  street  that  the  stable  devoured  horses. 
They  saw  two  or  three  horses  go  into  its  great  mouth  of 
a  door,  and  they  seldom  saw  any  horses  come  out  again. 
They  were  very  stupid  houses,  and  they  could  not  tell 
one  horse  from  another;  they  did  not  notice  that  the  same 
three  horses  went  into  the  stable  every  night,  and  they 
could  not  see,  of  course,  that  the  same  horses  came  out 
of  the  back  door,  safe  and  sound,  every  morning. 

So  when  the  little  stable  insisted  upon  having  gas  put 
in,  the  houses  grew  very  indignant. 

"  The   idea!"  said   one  of  the  oldest  residences;  "  I 


176     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

have  been  built  eighty-six  years,  and  I  never  had  gas  in 
my  life  !  I  think  if  oil  is  good  enough  for  me,  it  is  good 
enough  for  a  little  whippersnapper  of  a  stable  !  Who 
ever  heard  of  having  gas  in  a  stable,  anyway  ?" 


But  the  stable  had  its  own  way,  and  it  burnt  gas  every 
night,  so  that  its  two  little  windows  shone  brightly  and 
winked  mischievously  at  the  scornful  houses  opposite  till 
they  drew  their  shutters  and  slammed  their  doors  in  dis- 
gust. 


THE    FLYING    STABLE.  177 

Now,  the  little  boy  named  Yak  was  going  through  the 
West-end  of  Ligg  one  night,  and  he  came  to  Sly-street 
and  caught  sight  of  the  stable  that  was  lit  with  gas.  The 
stable  had  a  windmill  built  on  its  roof,  which  it  used  for 
pumping  water,  and  this  night  being  windy,  the  wheel  was 
flying  round  and  round  with  a  merry  rattle  and  clank  as 
it  pumped  the  water  into  the  tank  on  the  roof. 

"  Well,  well,"  said  Yak,  "  you  are  the  'cutest  stable  I've 
seen  for  a  long  time  !  You  have  all  the  modern  con- 
veniences, haven't  you  ?" 

"  Yes,"  said  the  red  stable,  turning  still  redder,  "  I  flat- 
ter myself  that  I  am  thoroughly  up-to-date." 

"  He  eats  horses  !"  screamed  the  old  three-story  house 
across  the  street. 

"  Is  that  true  ?  "  asked  Yak. 

The  stable  shut  one  window. 

"  I'll  go  inside  and  see,"  said  Yak. 

"  You'll  never  come  out ! "  cried  the  three-story 
house. 

But  Yak  went  in,  just  the  same,  and  shut  the  door  be- 
hind him,  and  locked  it,  so  the  stable  could  not  talk.  It 
was  beautifully  fitted  up  inside,  and  the  three  horses 
seemed  to  be  very  happy.  Yak  decided  to  spend  the 
night  there,  and,  not  being  used  to  gas,  hg  blew  out  all 
the  lights,  and  lay  down  on  the  straw.  The  stable  tried 


1 78     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

its  best  to  warn  him  of  his  danger  from  the  escaping  gas, 
but,  as  its  door  was  shut,  it  could  only  shake  and  tremble 
so  that  Yak  could  not  go  to  sleep. 

After  awhile  Yak  began  to  sniff  and  cough.  The  place 
smelt  abominably  as  the  gas  began  to  fill  up  the  lofts. 
So  Yak  got  up,  and  hearing  the  windmill  whirling  on  the 
roof,  he  climbed  out  of  an  upper  window,  closed  it  behind 
him,  and  crawled  over  the  eaves  clear  to  the  ridgepole. 

Suddenly,  feeling  very  ill,  the  stable  began  to  sway  and 
lurch  to  and  fro,  rocking  like  a  ship  in  the  sea,  and  then, 
as  it  became  filled  with  gas,  it  slowly  tore  away  from  its 
foundations  and  rose  steadily  in  the  air,  like  a  balloon. 
It  tried  and  tried  to  scream,  for  the  stable  was  more 
frightened  even  than  Yak  himself,  but  it  could  not  cry 
aloud,  because  its  door  was  shut.  So  it  sailed  up  into 
the  sky,  higher  and  higher. 

Yak  was  a  very  valourous  little  boy,  and  after  a  while 
he  began  to  enjoy  the  flying  trip  on  the  stable.  They 
were  borne  steadily  along  towards  the  sea  by  a  North 
wind,  and  by  daylight  they  were  over  the  harbour,  and  he 
could  see  the  water  miles  below  him.  But  how  should 
he  ever  get  back?  He  had  had  no  breakfast,  and  he 
began  to  get  very  hungry. 

The  windmill,  meanwhile,  had  stopped,  as  there  was  no 
more  water  to  pump,  and  Yak  thought  he  might,  by  set- 


THE     FLYING    STABLE.  179 

ting  the  wheel  going  backwards,  use  it  like  a  paddle  wheel 
and  navigate  his  airship  back  towards  the  City  o'  Ligg. 
The  plan  worked  very  well,  and  the  stable  headed  north- 
ward and  flew  alonof  till  it  eot  over  the  town. 

o  o 

There  were  several  balloons  in  the  sky,  who  had  come 
from  the  mountains,  where  they  lived,  and  these  teased 
Yak  and  the  poor  dumb  flying  stable  unmercifully,  for 
the  balloons  were  old  enemies  of  the  houses,  and  they 
were  convulsed  with  laughter  to  see  the  ridiculous  strug- 
gles of  the  stable  floating  high  amongst  the  clouds.  Two 
or  three  kites  also  appeared  and  flew  around  Yak,  offer- 
ing him  all  kinds  of  advice,  and  one  was  good  enough  to 
fetch  him  up  a  loaf  of  bread  for  his  breakfast. 

Now',  two  of  the  horses  had  been  soon  overcome  by 
the  fumes  of  the  gas,  and  had  fallen  so  fast  asleep  that 
they  never  woke  up  again,  but  one  of  them  had  been 
sleeping  near  a  crevice  in  the  wall,  and  when  he  awakened, 
feeling  very  queer  and  ill  with  the  strange  motions  of  the 
stable,  he  broke  loose  and  began  to  kick  at  the  front  door. 
Finally  he  succeeded  in  breaking  it  open,  and  in  that  way 
the  stable  was  able  to  talk  once  more. 

''Oh  dear!  oh  dear!"  it  cried,  "what  has  happened  ? 
I  never  felt  so  bad  in  my  life  !  Where  am  I  ? " 

"You're  up  in  the  air,"  said  Yak.  "Open  your  win- 
dows and  you'll  see." 


i8o     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

"  I  don't  dare  to,"  said  the  stable.  "  I'm  afraid  of  being 
giddy,  up  so  high  ! " 

"  You  can't  be  any  giddier  than  you  are  now,"  said 
Yak. 

And  as  that  was  true  enough,  the  stable  ventured  to 
open  one  window  and  look  down.  Immediately  the  gas 
began  to  escape  and  the  stable  dropped  through  the  air. 

"  Whoa  ! "  cried  Yak,  frightened  nearly  off  the  ridge- 
pole. "  Don't  open  your  windows  so  wide,  but  just  raise 
one  sash  a  little,  and  perhaps  we  shall  get  down  safely, 
after  all." 

This  the  stable  did,  and  they  fell  slowly  towards  the 
roofs  of  the  houses.  When  they  were  nearly  down,  Yak 
cried  out  :  "  Look  at  the  houses  all  watching  us  !  I  say, 
this  is  fun  !" 

At  this  remark  the  stable,  which  was  a  very  pert  and 
vain  little  building,  and  fond  of  admiration,  could  not  re- 
sist the  temptation  to  open  both  windows  very  wide,  to 
look  down  on  the  City  o'  Ligg,  and,  as  it  did  so,  a  sud- 
den gust  of  wind  swept  them  towards  the  church,  and  the 
poor  little  stable,  with  so  much  gas  escaping,  dropped 
with  a  downward  rush  right  upon  the  sharp  steeple  of  the 
church  and  stuck  there,  pierced  through  floor,  ceiling 
and  roof  by  the  slender  spire,  impaled  an  hundred  feet 
high  above  the  street ! 


THE    FLYING    STABLE.  181 

As  for  Yak,  he  was  again  nearly  thrown  off  the  roof 
by  the  sudden  fall  and  shock,  but  after  he  found  he  could 
go  no  further,  he  climbed  into  the  stable  through  a  win- 
dow to  see  how  he  could  escape.  After  hard  work  with 
a  pitchfork  and  rake,  he  succeeded  in  breaking  a  hole 
through  the  wall  of  the  steeple,  inside  the  stable  ;  and 
once  within  the  spire,  he  had  no  trouble  in  getting  down 
into  the  belfry,  and  out  through  the  church,  safe  as  even 

But  for  the  rest  of  its  life  the  stable  had  to  remain  fixed 
to  the  church  spire,  an  object  of  derision  to  all  the  houses 
of  the  City  o'  Ligg  ;  and  inside  its  walls,  too,  the  poor 
horse  had  to  stay,  all  his  life,  being  fed  through  the  hole 
in  the  spire,  and  getting  so  little  exercise  that  he  grew 
fatter  and  fatter.  For  many  years  after  that  he  could  be 
seen  poking  his  nose  from  the  window  of  the  stable  in 
the  air,  gazing  thoughtfully  over  the  roofs  of  the  City  o' 
Ligg,  pitying  the  poor  horses  below,  who  had  to  work  all 
day  and  had  never  seen  the  top  of  a  house  in  their  lives. 


THE    BLIND     CAMERA. 


THERE  were  many  Cameras  living  in  the  Ligg  Photo- 
graphic Parlours,  artists  who  looked  down  with  scorn  upon 
all  other  machines,  not  only  upon  the  manufacturing 
or  working  members  of  the  community,  but  upon  such 
aristocrats  as  the  Bicycles  and  Balloons  as  well.  The 
musical  instruments  they  recognised  as  artists,  it  is  true, 
but  it  was  the  Cameras'  opinion  that  most  musical  instru- 
ments were  a  bit  mad.  Even  the  Very  Grand  Pianos 
often  got  out  of  tune ;  and,  besides,  they  were  all  totally 
blind,  from  the  Penny  Whistles  to  the  Church  Organs. 
The  Cameras  themselves  were  deaf  and  dumb,  but  they 
never  thought  of  that,  as  they  had  the  best  eyes  of  all 
the  objects  in  the  City  o'  Ligg,  except  the  Telescopes, 
and  the  Telescopes  didn't  count  ;  they  were  not  artists— 
they  were  merely  elaborate  tools. 


i88    THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

All  sorts  of  Cameras  worked  in  the  Photographic 
Parlours.  There  were  little  Kodak  and  snap-shot  affairs, 
and  hundreds  of  Tripod  Cameras  who  could  walk  on 
three  legs ;  besides  these,  there  were  the  big  studio  por- 
trait Cameras  mounted  on  wheels,  who  rolled  majestically 
around  the  rooms,  wrapped  in  their  robes  of  black  velvet. 
Some  of  these  machines  could  take  full-size  pictures,  and 
used  enormously  expensive  plates. 

The  mpst  intelligent  of  them  all,  however,  was  a 
medium-sized,  or  6-inch  by  8-i-nch,  Tripod  Camera.  He 
did  not  have  such  expensive  fittings  as  some  of  the  others, 
for  he  was  not  able  to  afford  wide-angle  lenses  and  iris 
diaphragms,  but  he  used  rather  quick  plates,  and  his 
shutter,  though  not  of  the  latest  pattern,  gave  a  rapid, 
clean  exposure,  and  he  could  focus  as  sharply  as  many  of 
the  big  instruments.  He  wore  a  small,  yellow  felt  focus- 
ing cap,  and  did  a  good  deal  of  work — outside  mostly — 
for  he  knew  the  town  well,  and  could  gauge  the  amount 
of  light  required  to  the  sixteenth  part  of  a  second  ;  in- 
deed, he  had  taken  very  successful  pictures  in  the  rain. 

It  was  the  6-inch  by  8-inch  Camera  who  took  most  of 
the  pictures  illustrating  these  stories,  so  you  can  see  for 
yourself  how  clever  he  was. 

Now,  all  Cameras,  as  is  well  known,  see  things  upside 
down  on  their  ground-glass  screen  ;  to  them,  the  whole 


THE    BLIND    CAMERA.  189 

world  is  topsy-turvy  ;  but  they  are  so  used  to  it  that  they 
think  it  quite  natural  for  carts  to  roll  along  with  their 
wheels  in  the  air,  and  for  things  to  fall  up  instead  of 
down ;  they  have  never  known  anything  different.  If 
you  will  stand  on  your  head  for  a  few  minutes,  or  walk 
round  the  room  on  your  hands,  you  will  get  a  very  good 
idea  how  the  world  seems  to  Cameras,  except  that  it 
doesn't  seem  strange  to  them,  and  they  never  get  dizzy 
or  top-heavy. 

One  day,  as  the  6-inch  by  8-inch  was  returning  from 
taking  a  picture  of  the  Flying  Stable,  he  dropped  into  a 
shop  on  Queer-street,  where  he  used  to  buy  his  chemicals, 
and  there  he  found  for  sale  a  new  lens,  the  only  one  of 
its  kind  ever  manufactured,  which,  he  was  told,  was  quite 
a  curiosity.  No  one  had  been  willing  to  buy  it,  for  the 
brass  tube  was  so  filled  with  prisms  and  reflectors  that  no 
C-invra  cared  to  risk  his  eyesight  by  using  such  a  new- 
fangled thing.  The  6-inch  by  8-inch,  however,  was  a 
curious  instrument,  and  fond  of  experiments,  so  he 
bought  the  queer  lens,  and  took  it  home. 

He  went  directly  into  the  dark  room,  took  out  his  old 
lens,  and  inserted  the  new  one.  Then  he  opened  the 
door  and  stepped  out  into  the  studio  to  tell  the  others 
about  it.  As  the  light  struck  him,  the  Camera  staggered 
on  his  tripod,  and  fell — up  to  the  ceiling,  as  he  thought — 


i9oTHE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

for  the  whole  place  seemed  upside  down  !  He  sank  on  a 
painted  imitation  balustrade,  and  put  on  his  cap  in  terror, 
not  daring  to  look  again.  The  other  Cameras  crowded 
round  him,  offering  him  draughts  of  hypo,  and  imploring 
him  to  tell  them  what  was  the  matter. 


The  truth  was  that  the  combination  of  prisms  inside 
the  new  lens  tube  cast  the  image  of  the  things  it  pointed 
at  upon  the  screen  upright  instead  of  inverted,  as  usual, 
and  the  6-inch  by  8-inch  had  for  the  first  time  seen  the 
world  right  side  up.  It  was  a  long  time  before  he 
recovered  from  his  dizziness  sufficiently  to  speak. 

"  I  remember  having  heard  that  we  Cameras  see  things 


THE    BLIND    CAMERA.  191 

in  a  different  way  from  other  instruments,"  said  an  old 
wet-plate  Camera,  after  the  6-inch  by  8-inch  had  explained 
his  bewilderment ;  "  but,  of  course,  as  we  can  see  better 
than  any  other  machines,  it  must  be  that  they  see  things 
upside  down.  This  new  lens  seems  to  reverse  the  image 
in  some  way — but  it's  no  kind  of  a  way  for  Cameras  to 
see  at  all — we  can't  be  expected  to  walk  on  the  ceiling 
like  flies,  can  we  ?  You'd  better  take  the  thing  out,  and 
not  try  to  stand  on  your  head!  Nobody  can  take  pic- 
tures upside  down  ;  it  isn't  natural  !  " 

By  this  time  the  Tripod  Camera  had  ventured  to  peep 
out  through  the  lens  again,  and  he  exclaimed,  "  Why, 
you're  standing  upside  down  yourself  ! " 

"Nonsense,"  said  the  old  Portrait  Camera,  " you're 
crazy  ! " 

All  the  other  Cameras  were  of  the  same  opinion,  when 
the  6-inch  by  8-inch  rose  to  his  three  legs,  and  looked 
round  the  room  with  great  amusement.  He  promenaded 
unsteadily  up  and  down  the  studio,  trying  to  get  used  to 
the  strange  topsy-turviness,  stumbling  among  the  chairs 
and  furniture,  like  a  sailor  on  a  heaving  deck.  He  did 
not  realise  that  he  was  in  the  same  position  as  the  others, 
for  he  felt  the  floor  beneath  his  feet,  and  he  thought  it  a 
great  joke  that  all  the  Cameras  clustered  about  him,  and 
even  the  little  pocket  Kodaks  on  the  shelves  were  star- 


192     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 


ing-  at  him  upside  down.  After  a  while  he  got  so  he 
could  walk  fairly  well,  and  he  went  down  the  stairs  very 
carefully,  and  out  into  the  street. 

He  thought  it  would  be  sport  to  take  a  picture  of  the 
Old  Church  upside  down.  It  would  make  a  great  scan- 
dal in  the  City  o'  Ligg,  for  the  stone  Church  was  highly 
respected ;  in  fact,  the  picture  would  undoubtedly  be 
suppressed. 

The  whole  City  seemed  to  him  to  be  enchanted,  or  as 
if  he  were  in  some  crazy  dream.  The  Camera  was 
nearly  run  down  several  times  by  Motor  Cars  running 
past  with  their  wheels  in  the  air,  and  when  he  reached 
the  Church,  the  sight  of  that  stately,  respectable  old 
edifice,  with  its  steeple  pointed  downward  and  its  foun- 
dations in  the  sky,  was  so  funny  that  he  could  not  keep 
still  for  giggling.  He  chuckled  as  he  focused  his  lens, 
so  that  the  Church  and  all  the  Houses  seemed  to  writhe 
and  wriggle,  too.  He  shook  with  spasms  of  laughter  as  he 
drew  out  his  slide,  and  when  he  exposed  his  plate  he  was 
gasping  and  trembling  in  the  silliest  fashion.  It  was  no 
use,  it  was  too  funny  ;  he  knew  he  had  spoiled  the 
plate. 

He  tried  a  picture  of  a  row  of  Houses,  and  found  it  as 
hard  to  keep  sober.  So  he  stood  on  his  head,  and  in 
this  undignified  position  he  took  another  picture  more 


THE    BLIND    CAMERA.  193 

calmly,  for  then  the  Houses  shown  on  his  ground-glass 
screen  seemed,  at  last,  right  side  up.  But  even  then  he 
couldn't  help  going  off  into  little  convulsions  of  laughter, 
every  little  while,  at  the  thought  of  how  absurd  the 
Church  had  appeared. 

When  he  got  back  to  the  studio,  and  developed  the 
plates  in  the  dark  room,  he  found  the  pictures  were  the 
queerest  he  had  ever  printed.  The  perspective  was  all 
wrong,  the  pictures  were  out  of  focus,  the  film  had  melted 
and  run,  distorting  the  Houses  so  that  they  seemed  made 
of  soft  wax  which  had  been  left  too  long  in  the  sun — but, 
strange  to  say,  they  were  still  right  side  up,  after  all  !  He 
could  not  understand  it. 

The  next  day,  after  a  good  night's  sleep,  he  got  up, 
and,  forgetting  all  about  the  new  lens,  he  started  to  walk 
across  the  studio  without  noticing.  When,  however,  he 
did  really  look  around,  he  saw  the  room  was  upside 
down  again,  and  again  he  was  so  terrified  at  the  bewilder- 
ing sight  that  he  lost  his  balance  and  fell,  hitting  the  end 
of  the  lens  tube  with  terrific  force,  smashing  all  the  prisms 
and  lenses  into  little  pieces. 

When  he  at  last  revived,  after  having  been  taken  to 
the  dark  room,  the  Cameras  found  that  the  poor  6-inch  by 
8-inch  was  totally  blind.  They  put  lens  after  lens  into 
his  eye  tube,  but  though  he  could  sometimes  see  well 


i94     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

enough  to  be  able  to  crawl  around  the  room  in  the  sun- 
light, he  was  never  able  to  print  any  more  pictures. 

Of  course  he  tried,  continually,  exposing  plate  after 
plate  in  hopes  he  might  be  able  to  print  some  sort  of  a 
picture,  but  though  he  tried  salt  prints  and  silver  prints, 
gold  and  platinum  prints,  blue  prints  and  bromides,  there 
was  never  anything  but  a  blur  on  the  paper,  for  his  nega- 
tives were  almost  opaque,  as  if  they  had  been  painted 
with  varnish.  And  so,  disappointed  and  miserable,  he 
pined  away. 

The  other  Cameras  in  the  Ligg  Photographic  Parlours 
were  very  sorry  for  the  poor  6-inch  by  8-inch,  not  only  be- 
cause he  was  blind,  but  because  they  all  considered  him 
crazy.  The  Tripod  Camera  was  all  the  time  talking 
about  what  he  called  his  "  revelation,"  or  the  strange 
idea  of  the  world  the  mysterious  lens  had  given  him.  It 
was  his  firm  idea  that  the  Cameras  all  saw  things  wrongly, 
and  that  what  they  would  call  upside  down  was  really 
right  side  up,  and  that  things  really  fell  down  instead  of 
up.  But  the  Cameras  only  laughed  to  each  other  when 
the  6-inch  by  8-inch  talked  like  this,  and  said,  when  he 
had  gone,  "  Poor  thing  !  that  fall  cracked  him  badly  !  " 

But  the  fall  had,  indeed,  affected  him  more  than  they 
thought,  for,  after  he  was  found  one  winter  morning,  still 
and  cold,  at  the  window,  looking  for  the  rising  sun,  and 


THE    BLIND    CAMERA.  195 

they  knew  that  he  would  never  crawl  around  on  his  three 
legs  any  more,  or  try  and  take  his  hopeless  little  prints, 
they  came  across  a  pile  of  negatives  of  his  in  a  dark  room. 
No  one  knew  that  he  had  taken  so  many  pictures,  and  the 
Cameras  were  about  to  throw  the  meaningless,  opaque 
sheets  of  glass  into  the  dustbin,  sadly,  at  the  thought  of 
the  poor  Camera's  pathetic  struggles  to  see,  when  sud- 
denly the  oldest  studio  Portrait  Camera,  the  old  wet- 
plate  machine,  caught  a  glimpse  of  something  on  one  of 
the  negatives. 

"  Look  !  look!"  he  cried,  in  great  excitement,  and  he 
pointed  to  a  negative  that  stood  slantwise  on  the  shelf. 
As  the  light  struck  it  obliquely,  and  was  reflected  from 
its  film,  there  appeared  on  the  surface  of  the  plate  the 
most  wonderful  picture  the  Cameras  had  ever  seen. 
When  the  plate  was  viewed  directly,  it  was  nothing  but  a 
dull,  colourless  sheet  of  film,  but,  looking  in  this  slanting 
way,  in  the  reflected  light,  it  was  a  perfect  picture,  in  all 
the  true  colours  of  nature  !  The  sky  showed  blue,  the 
trees  were  green,  the  flowers  were  red  and  yellow  !  The 
poor  6-inch  by  8-inch  Camera  had  taken  better  pictures 
than  he  ever  knew. 

The  negatives  were  all  saved,  and  put  in  a  picture 
gallery,  where  they  were  exhibited  as  the  most  wonderful 
curiosities  of  the  City  o'  Ligg.  From  time  to  time, 


196     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'LIGG. 

stereopticon  shows  were  given,  and  the  marvellously 
beautiful  views  thrown  on  the  screen  were  the  delight  of 
all  the  inhabitants.  As  time  went  on  the  fame  of  the  6- 
inch  by  8-inch  Camera  grew  and  grew,  and  now  he  is 
universally  acknowledged  to  have  been  the  most  talented 
artist  that  Ligg  has  ever  produced,  and  his  genius  is 
spoken  of  with  immense  pride. 

But,  in  spite  of  that,  the  Cameras  still  believe,  and 
probably  always  will  believe,  that  the  6-inch  by  8-inch 
was  crazy,  because  he  always  insisted  that  upside  down 
was  right  side  up  ! 


THE    BUMPTIOUS    BRIDGE 


GELETT    BURGESS 


THERE  were  three  bridges  over  the  river  Wob  :  the 
funny  tubular  girder,  which  confined  the  bothersome  brig, 
the  stone  arches  near  the  batteries,  and  the  suspension- 
bridge,  above  the  city.  The  last  was  the  most  disagree- 
able of  them  all ;  finally,  it  went  altogether  too  far,  and 
got  itself  into  trouble. 

It  was  not  a  good,  honest  suspension-bridge,  hung 
from  wire  cables,  as  a  suspension-bridge  rightly  should 
be,  but  it  was  supported  by  iron  rods  and  straps,  almost 
like  a  girder  or  a  truss.  Its  floor  rose  in  a  long  curve, 
almost  like  an  arch  ;  altogether  it  was  a  mixture  of  styles, 
a  mongrel  bridge  with  a  beastly  temper — no  one  thought 
it  was  safe. 

It  had  four  great  cast-iron  towers,  which  rested  on  con- 
crete piers -in  the  river,  and  the  ends  of  its  suspenders,  as 
the  jointed  rods  which  were  stretched  over  the  towers 


202     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'LIGG. 

might  be  called,  were  anchored  to  masonry  abutments, 
over  which  were  built  little  wooden  pavilions.  What 
made  the  bridge  more  dangerous  was  that  it  had  no 
sway-bracing,  so  that  it  trembled  and  shook  in  the  wind, 
like  a  camel  catching  a  cold,  and  more  than  one  electric 
car  had  been  thrown  off  the  track  by  the  vibration,  while 
crossing  the  river  on  the  suspension  bridge. 

The  bridge  was  always  a  growler  and  a  grumbler,  but, 
when  the  ferry  line  was  established,  plying  across  the 
river  from  the  City  o'  Ligg  to  the  Highland  side,  the 
Suspension  was  almost  unbearable. 

"  Ain't  1  good  enough  to  take  you  across  ?  "  he  com- 
plained. "  What's  the  use  of  going  by  water  when  you 
can  go  by  land  ?  "  But  as  he  charged  two  cents  toll,  and 
the  ferry-boats  carried  passengers  for  one  cent,  nearly 
every  one  took  the  steamers,  who  puffed  across  the  river 
all  day  long,  going  and  coming  beneath  the  very  floor 
of  the  bridge,  smothering  it  in  smoke. 

One  Saturday,  the  bridge,  who  had  had  hardly  a  pas- 
senger crossing  for  a  week,  resolved  not  to  stand  it  any 
longer.  "  If  they  don't  want  to  use  me  any  more,"  he 
said,  "  I'll  be  hanged  to  my  towers  if  I'll  stay  here  any 
longer  for  them  to  laugh  at  !"  So  he  pulled,  angrily, 
with  all  his  might,  on  his  rods  and  straps  and  hangers 
and  braces,  till  it  seemed  as  if  he  were  going  to  pull  up 


THE    BUMPTIOUS    BRIDGE.      203 

his  anchorage  by  the  roots.  Instead  of  that,  however,  he 
broke  his  suspenders  off  short,  on  the  Highland  side,  and 
the  jerk,  when  the  rods  snapped,  threw  him  over,  upside 
down,  splashing  and  sprawling  in  the  middle  of  the  River 
Wob,  to  the  terror  of  the  ferry-boats  who  were  passing. 
He  struggled  wildly  for  a  while,  in  the  water,  his  concrete 
piers  in  the  air,  and  his  cast-iron  towers  wobbling  like  a 
baby's  legs  under  him,  all  his  tension  members,  that  were 
built  to  resist  pulling,  being  compressed  and  bent  out  of 
shape,  and  all  his  compression  members,  that  were  built 
to  resist  pushing  and  pressing,  being  pulled  at  unmerci- 
fully. It  was  very  painful  in  this  unaccustomed  position, 
but  the  bridge  managed  at  last  to  crawl  along  up  to  the 
bank  on  the  City  o'  Ligg  side,  till  his  two  front  tower- 
legs  climbed  upon  the  track  of  the  Railway.  Here  he 
stood  a  while,  resting,  his  two  rear  towers  still  in  the 
deepest  part  of  the  River  Wob. 

There  was  a  big  semaphore  across  the  railway,  at  that 
point,  and  it  cried  to  the  bridge,  "  What  'O  !  get  off  the 
track  !  "  and  it  held  up  all  its  arms  to  warn  the  trains 
not  to  pass. 

"I'm  going  to  stay  right  here!"  said  the  Bumptious 
Bridge  ;  "  if  the  trains  don't  want  to  go  over  me,  they  can 
go  round  me!"  and  it  chuckled  to  itself,  to  find  how 
easily  it  would  get  its  revenge. 


204     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O '    LIGG. 

« 

Pretty  soon  a  train  appeared,  far  down  the  track, 
whistling  and  roaring.  When  it  saw  the  semaphore  warn- 
ing it  to  stop,  it  slowed  up  and  came  on  slowly,  stopping 
in  front  of  the  bridge  tower  that  prevented  its  passing. 
The  engine,  which  was  of  English  make,  pushed  its  buf- 
fers against  the  tower  with  all  its  strength,  but  it  couldn't 
budge  the  bridge.  The  engine  grew  more  and  more 
angry,  butting  and  bellowing  with  great  fury,  but  it  was 
no  use.  It  could  not  pass  the  obstruction  that  way. 

Soon  another  whistle  was  heard,  and  another  train 
came  flying  down  the  line,  from  the  other  direction.  It 
was  the  Ligg  Fast  Mail.  When  it  saw  the  semaphore 
waving  its  arms,  it  slowed  up,  too,  and  came  cautiously 
along  till  it  reached  the  bridge.  "  What  'O  !  What's 
the  matter  ?  "  it  cried. 

The  bridge  didn't  even  trouble  itself  to  answer  ques- 
tions. There  it  was,  and  there  it  was  going  to  stay. 
But  the  Mail  Train  was  in  a  hurry  ;  it  would  never  do  to 
be  interfered  with  in  this  fashion. 

Now  the  Mail  Train  was  of  American  manufacture,  with 
a  big  locomotive,  and  cars  with  platforms  and  doors  in 
the  ends,  in  the  American  style.  The  engine  had  huge, 
high  boilers,  and  its  piston  and  steam  chest  were  outside  ; 
it  had  a  big  smokestack  with  a  wood-burning  funnel,  a 
cowcatcher,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing.  It  was  built  for 


THE    BUMPTIOUS    BRIDGE.      205 

steep  grades  and  sharp  curves,  and  it  could  do  a  mile  a 
minute,  easily.  It  did  not  propose  to  be  stopped  by  a 
mongrel  suspension-bridge  with  cast-iron  towers,  if  it 
were  upside  down  on  the  line. 

So  the  Mail  Train  backed  up  the  line  about  a  mile,  and 
then  the  locomotive  opened  its  throttle  and  tore  down 
the  track  at  full  speed.  When  it  got  near  the  towers, 
the  train  gave  a  TREMENDOUS  leap  into  the  air,  and  hur- 
dled the  bridge  as  prettily  as  a  hunting  horse  takes  a 
five-barred  gate,  and  came  gracefully  clown  upon  the 
track  on  the  other  side,  exactly  on  the  rails,  and  then, 
without  so  much  as  stopping  to  say  good-bye,  that  Fast 
Mail  tore  down  the  track  for  the  City  o'  Ligg,  to  make 
up  for  lost  time. 

The  English  train  felt  rather  cheap,  after  this  perform- 
ance, and  it  backed  down  the  line  for  a  half  a  mile,  while 
the  bridge  was  laughing.  Finally  it  came  to  a  little  coal- 
crane,  on  a  wharf  beside  the  riven  The  crane  was  very 
sympathetic,  and  offered  its  services.  "  I  think  I  might 
throw  your  carriages  into  the  river,  one  by  one,"  it  said. 
"  They're  little  ones,  and  not  so  heavy,  and  they'd  float 
down  stream,  and  no  doubt  help  would  be  sent,  when 
they  were  seen." 

As  there  seemed  to  be  no  other  way  out  of  the  dilemma, 
the  Locomotive  reluctantly  consented  to  allow  the  exper- 


206    THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

iment  to  be  tried.  The  crane  picked  up  the  carriages, 
one  by  one,  grabbing  them  by  their  ventilators,  then 
swung  itself  round  on  its  pivot  and  tossed  them  into  the 
river.  They  floated  off,  in  a  bobbling  procession,  clown 


stream,  and,  just  as  the  guard's  van  dropped  into  the 
water,  a  torpedo  boat  came  snuffling  up  the  river,  in  a 
great  hurry. 

"What's   all  this?"   he   said,   excitedly.     "  I    thought 
these  were  some  new  kind  of  destroyers  coming  down  to 


THE    BUMPTIOUS    BRIDGE.      207 

attack  the  City  o'  Ligg,  for  sure  !  Lucky  for  those  third- 
class  carriages  that  I  made  out  their  numbers  in  time.  I 
was  just  going  to  pepper  them  with  my  rapid-fire  guns  !" 

The  torpedo  boat  seemed  to  be  much  disappointed  that 
there  was  no  enemy  to  be  fought,  after  all,  but  when  it 
heard  about  the  suspension-bridge,  and  how  it  had 
blocked  the  traffic  on  the  road,  it  brightened  up  a  bit. 
"  I'll  settle  him  !  "  it  said,  and  it  shoved  a  Whitehead  tor- 
pedo, full  of  clock-work  and  dynamite,  into  its  tube,  and 
puffed  gaily  up  stream. 

The  Locomotive  followed  it  up  the  line,  cautiously,  but 
all  the  crane  was  able  to  see  of  what  happened  was  a 
huge  puff  of  white  smoke  and  spray,  and  a  scattering  of 
little  rods,  straps  and  braces,  like  a  handful  of  jackstraws 
tossed  into  the  air.  But  next  day  the  Locomotive  came 
back  to  thank  the  crane,  and  told  it  that  there  was  to  be 
a  new  bridge  built  at  the  same  place,  a  wrought-iron 
cantilever  drawbridge  of  the  latest  design,  and  that  they 
hadn't  found  enough  of  the  old  suspension-bridge  to  use 
for  fish-line  sinkers. 

But,  somehow,  the  English  locomotive  never  seemed 
to  be  very  friendly  with  the  American  Fast  Mail,  after 
that  ! 


THE    ECCENTRIC    LOOM. 


EOT 


IT  was  very  evident  that  Loom  No.  7  was  crazy.  All 
the  other  weaving  machines  in  the  mill  laughed  at  her, 
and  yet  they  were  a  bit  afraid  of  her,  too.  She  worked  a 
deal  more  swiftly  and  noiselessly  than  they,  and  she 
never  seemed  to  get  tired  and  never  broke  down. 

All  the  other  looms  followed  the  fashions  very  care- 
fully. If  stripes  were  in  style,  they  wove  stripes,  or  if 
the  latest  mode  demanded  plaids,  or  checks,  or  pin 
points,  or  polka  dots,  they  all  worked  busily  at  these 
patterns — all,  that  is,  except  No.  7. 

No  one  had  ever  seen  before  such  queer  patterns  as 
the  crazy  loom  wove.  Her  designs  seemed  absolutely 
meaningless  to  the  other  machines.  They  had  never 
seen  such  hideous  combinations  of  colour,  they  said,  for 
they  used  the  regular  blues  and  browns  and  reds,  while 


214    THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

No.  7  filled  her  bobbins  with  all  sorts  of  unheard-of 
hues.  Such  monotonous,  crude  tints  they  were,  in  the 
opinion  of  the  other  machines,  that  they  wondered  she 
was  allowed  steam  power  at  all — surely,  she  was  only 
wasting  good  material. 

But  Loom  No.  7  paid  no  attention  whatever  to  her 
associates,  and  threw  her  shuttles  back  and  forth  all  clay, 
often  keeping  on  through  the  lunch  hour,  while  the  other 
looms  were  being  oiled  and  cleaned.  She  always  seemed 
to  be  intensely  interested  in  her  work,  too,  and  rattled 
and  clicked  away  to  herself  and  never  talked  to  the 
others.  As  she  rumbled  steadily  along,  the  wide  roll  of 
fabric  she  was  weaving  grew  fatter  and  fatter,  and  when 
she  stopped  to  put  in  a  bobbin  of  salmon  or  olive-green 
into  her  warp  or  woof,  she  would  look  carefully  at  the 
mysterious  pattern  on  her  tapestry,  as  if  it  really  meant 
something  to  her,  and  she  seemed  to  know  perfectly 
whether  or  not  she  had  dropped  a  stitch  or  broken  a 
thread.  Then  she  would  rattle  all  over  and  hurry  on, 
bangy-ty-bang,  thumpy-ty-thump,  as  if  she  were  afraid  she 
wouldn't  last  long  enough  to  finish  the  piece. 

Now  at  the  end  of  each  month  the  foreman  came 
around  to  collect  and  carry  away  the  finished  pieces  of 
cloth  from  the  looms,  and  on  the  very  day  that  No.  7 
completed  her  roll  of  tapestry,  he  came  into  the  mill- 


THE    ECCENTRIC    LOOM.          215 

sheds  with  the  Mayor  of  the  City  o'  Ligg  and  the  little 
boy  named  Yak.  The  Mayor  had  just  built  himself  a 
new  house,  and  he  had  come  to  select  stuff  with  which  to 
furnish  it,  and  Yak  had  come  to  help  him  in  his  choice. 

So  they  went  with  the  foreman  of 'the  mill  from  one 
loom  to  another  inspecting  the  different  patterns.  "  These 
are  all  alike,"  said  Yak.  "  Can't  you  show  us  something- 
new  and  interesting  ?  " 

"  Well,  no,"  said  the  foreman.  "  We  mostly  follow 
the  prevailing  styles  in  this  mill,  and  all  the  patterns  are 
pretty  much  alike.  But  come  over  this  way,  I'll  show 
you  something  queer!"  He  led  them  over  to  No.  7, 
and  the  Mayor  and  Yak  looked  curiously  at  the  roll  of 
tapestry. 

The  Mayor  laughed.  "That  is  a  crazy  design,  isn't 
it?"  he  said.  "  I  don't  see  how  you  can  afford  to  keep 
a  loom  running  on  this  insane  tapestry.  You'll  never  be 
able  to  sell  this  stuff  ! " 

The  foreman  scratched  his  head,  and  said,  thought- 
fully, "  No,  I  suppose  not — and  yet,  I  dunno  !  It  seems 
to  me  that  the  loom  is  either  crazy,  as  you  say,  or  else  it 
is  a  mighty  clever  machine  ;  altogether  too  clever  for  me. 
I  confess  I  can't  understand  it  at  all,  and  that's  the  reason 
why  I  have  an  idea  it  must  be  something  wonderful. 
What  d'you  think,  Yak?" 


216     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

Yak  was  silently  examining  the  design,  very  carefully, 
and  said  nothing  for  some  time.  Finally  he  said  to  the 
foreman  : 

"You  send  this  roll  of  tapestry  up  to  the  Mayor's 
hou»se,  and  let  me  study  it  out,  and  I'll  let  you  know  in  a 
day  or  so  what  I  think." 

The  Mayor  was  surprised  at  this,  for  he  was  quite  sure 


he  would  never  want  such  a  jumbled,  unfinished  thing  in 
his  house,  but  he  had  a  great  deal  of  faith  in  little  Yak, 
and  he  made  no  objection.  So  the  roll  of  tapestry  was 
taken  away,  to  the  consternation  of  all  the  other  looms, 
who  whispered  to  each  other,  '•  I  say,  No.  7  may  not  be 


THE    ECCENTRIC    LOOM.  217 

such  a  fool  as  we  thought,  after  all !  I  always  thought 
she  was  pretty  deep.  She's  a  'cute  one,  that  No.  7  ! " 

In  two  days  Yak  sent  for  the  Mayor  and  the  foreman. 
He  had  been  cutting  up  the  tapestry,  and  had  it  all 
spread  out  on  a  bare  floor  in  the  new  dining-room,  and, 
to  the  surprise  of  the  two  men,  they  saw  that,  in  the 
way  Yak  had  pieced  it  together,  as  it  should  go  on  the 
walls  of  the  room,  the  whole  sheet  of  tapestry  formed  a 
beautiful  and  elaborate  design  of  great  vigour  and  origi- 
nality, and  that  the  juxtaposition  of  colours  formed  a 
fresh  and  charming  scheme  of  decoration  that  delighted 
them  both.  None  of  this  had  been  noticeable  in  the 
narrow  strips  woven  by  the  crazy  loom,  but  many  of 
them,  placed  side  by  side  and  properly  matched,  made  a 
single  dignified  and  interesting  design,  appropriate  for 
the  decoration  of  such  an  apartment  as  the  dining-room 
of  the  Mayor  of  the  City  o'  Ligg. 

When  the  foreman  went  back  to  the  mill,  he  oiled  up 
No.  7  very  carefully,  and  filled  her  bobbins  with  the 
most  expensive  silk  skeins,  tissues  of  gold  and  silver,  and 
threads  dyed  with  the  rarest  hues  ;  he  had  all  her  parts 
rubbed,  cleaned  and  polished,  so  that  she  shone  like  an 
Empress  upon  her  throne. 

The  othrr  looms  were  jealous  and  envious  at  this,  yet 
they  did  not  hesitate  to  imitate  No.  7  as  best  they  could. 


2i8     THE    LIVELY    CITY    O'    LIGG. 

If  it  were  the  fashion  to  be  crazy,  and  weave  mad  patterns 
of  no  possible  meaning  or  form,  why  then  they  would  not 
bother  to  follow  their  cards,  but  would  throw  their  shuttles 
across  haphazard.  So  that  month  the  looms  in  the  mill 
had  a  gay  time,  bouncing  along  carelessly,  joking,  and 
misbehaving  themselves  generally.  They  never  troubled 
to  stop  if  a  thread  broke  or  knotted,  for  what  difference 
did  it  make  ?  If  No.  7  could  go  on  as  she  pleased, 
without  rule  or  reason,  making  up  her  pattern  as  she 
went  along,  why  shouldn't  they  ?  If  it  were  the  clever 
thing  to  be  incomprehensible,  they  could  weave  nonsense 
as  well  as  she,  and  so  they  went  on  with  their  foolish  and 

ridiculous  work  for  a  month. 

• 

When  the  foreman  came  around  next  time,  however, 
to  inspect  the  work  of  the  looms,  and  saw  the  absurd, 
nonsensical  botches  upon  which  the  silly  machines  had 
wasted  their  materials,  he  grew  very  angry.  The  stuff 
was  not  good  enough  even  for  sacking,  for  it  was  weakly 
woven,  full  of  holes  and  knots  and  loops,  besides  being 
of  such  barbarous  patterns  that  it  made  his  eyes  ache  to 
look  at  the  rolls  of  fabric.  He  ordered  the  looms  to  be 
stripped  of  their  silks  and  woolen  threads  and  had  all 
their  bobbins  filled  with  rough  hemp  and  jute  of  a  horri- 
ble dirt  colour,  and  set  them  to  work  on  the  coarsest 
bagging.  But  the  roll  from  No.  7,  who  had  worked 


THE    ECCENTRIC    LOOM. 


219 


patiently  and  carefully  all  the  month,  he  had  wrapped 
carefully  and  packed  in  tinfoil  and  sent,  in  a  solid  mahog- 
any case,  to  the  International  Industrial  Exposition  of 
the  year. 

The  looms  could  never  understand  it,  and  they  hated 
No.  7  more  than  ever.  But  No.  7  kept  on  quietly,  with- 
out condescending  to  answer  their  sneers  and  ridicule. 
She  could  have  explained  the  whole  thing,  if  she  had 
cared,  perhaps,  but  she  had  no  time  to  talk. 


